The aim of the Make it a Life Foundation is to support destitute, single mothers and their children in Africa by helping them to help themselves.
What is “Make it a Life Foundation”?
The foundation is currently active in Akim Oda, a town in the Eastern Region on the Birim River in the West African state of Ghana.
As everywhere in the world, women and girls are the worst affected by poverty. That is why we support destitute, single women and make sure that girls do not take a back seat to boys in any way in our program.
The Make it a life Foundation is officially registered as foundation in Ghana, Nana Attafuah I St. EB-0005-9057, Akim Oda
Initial situation
In Akim Oda, as everywhere in Africa and the world, there are many single mothers who are left alone by the fathers of their children and who are destitute and can barely earn a living for their children, or only under the most difficult conditions. They often have to leave their children unattended all day in order to work. The children of these mothers, who in many cases are left to fend for themselves without help, often live in conditions in which the children are usually not guaranteed regular meals, little caring attention and insufficient clothing.
Children do not go to school or the results of their school education are often characterized by major deficits. Although school attendance is compulsory, enforcement and implementation are often inadequate. It is common for children to end their schooling illiterate.
The lack of basic skills in reading, writing and life planning leads to continued poverty and lack of opportunities and often ultimately to migration and emigration.
The foundation – Make it a Life Foundation Ghana – ensures that the children in its care are taught essential basic skills that enable them to shape their own lives and not succumb to the consequences of poverty and lack of opportunities. We want to contribute to giving destitute, single mothers and their children the tools for a future that excludes poverty, dependency and emigration.
What we do!
The foundation – Make it a Life foundation Ghana – supports destitute, single women by ensuring that their children go to school and are fed, so that their mothers can go to work without worrying because they know that their children are being looked after. At their own request, the mothers receive start-up assistance from us in the form of small financial amounts if they wish to become self-employed and pursue an independent activity (service, small trade, home-grown crops, etc.). In this way, the women are enabled to achieve a significant and sustainable improvement in their lives.
How we achieve these goals?
The NGO – Make it a Life Foundation, Ghana – runs a facility in Akim Oda, Ghana, where children and their mothers can eat, are looked after and taught basic skills. Kitchen, toilets, training rooms are available.
Mothers and children for whom the journey to this facility is too far are looked after in our partner schools, which are located nearby. Our partner schools are public schools that provide us with suitable premises. The foundation – Make it a Life Foundation, Ghana – provides volunteer teaching staff and volunteer supervisors who implement our line on site in accordance with our charter. It is ensured that the children can eat at their school in the mornings.
We also provide them with a warm lunch after school.
How does the foundation help?
- The children receive extra tuition and additional lessons to accompany their schooling
- The children receive warm meals
- The association covers the costs of teaching materials and school supplies
- The children receive clothing if required
- The mothers receive a small start-up aid to help themselves
- They receive advice and support in planning their lives
What is our concept?
We provide the children with extended practical knowledge to accompany and support their normal school education. This helps them to stabilize their everyday lives.
It also teaches them relevant skills for their future. To this end, the children take part in our after-school program at the facility of – Make it a Life Foundation – in Akim Oda, Ghana, as well as at our partner schools.
Our program teaches the children in a playful way to understand practical relationships, to strive for solutions in a group or individually, to shape their own lives and not to succumb to the consequences of a lack of education, poverty and lack of opportunities.
This is what we offer the children:
- Homework help
- Supplementary lessons in writing and arithmetic
- Language and writing games
- Cultivation of plants
- Working with natural materials
- Handicrafts
- Practical knowledge (simple, manual skills)
- Passing on traditions and making music
- Ecological methods for household and cultivation
- Dealing with money
We are constantly working on expanding the range!
The children and their mothers are supported in the sense of helping them to help themselves in order to achieve a sustainable stabilization of their living conditions. We support the mothers in planning their lives. Our aim is to stabilize the children’s lives and give them the tools for a future that prevents poverty, dependency and emigration.
We take country-specific, traditional circumstances into account in our programs. We teach the basics of hygiene and an ecological approach to the environment.
Sustainable concepts such as the economical use of water and energy, but also, for example, the use of solar stoves and home composting of waste are taken into account.
We are constantly working to expand our range of services. The children and their mothers are supported in the sense of helping them to help themselves in order to achieve a sustainable stabilization of their living conditions. We support the mothers in planning their lives.
We take country-specific, traditional circumstances into account in our services. We teach the basics of hygiene and an ecological approach to the environment. Our aim is to stabilize the children’s lives in the long term and to equip them for a future that prevents poverty, dependency and migration.
