Monrovia – The General Overseer of the New Water in the Desert Apostolic Pentecostal Church in Brewerville, Bishop Kortu K. Brown has disclosed plans to distribute 40, 000 assorted textbooks to schools across Liberia.
Bishop Brown, also head of the Concerned Christian Community or CCC Liberia and Church Aid Incorporated (CAI) asserted that the assorted textbooks which worth thousands of United States Dollars, will help complement secondary education and will cover all subjects as prescribed in the national curriculum by the Ministry of Education.
Church Aid Incorporated (CAI) was funded during the civil war in Liberia and has administered emergency and rehabilitation programs over the years that have benefitted more than half a million (500,000) Liberians.
Speaking with reporters while offloading the 40, 000 textbooks at Church Aid Incorporated Headquarters in Brewerville at the weekend, Bishop Brown stated that it is the organization’s contribution toward improving the education system especially in the areas of reading, writing and comprehension.
The religious prelate called for concerted efforts in revamping the messy education system in Liberia as publically declared years back by former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf that (Liberia’s Education System was a complete mess).
Church Aid Incorporated textbooks donation comes at a time the Ministry of Education had concluded a three day education reform Summit held in Margibi county from May 21-23, 2018 on wide-range discussions on issues affecting the education sector with conclusion on six thematic areas including Teacher Education & Professionalization, Monitoring, Supervision & Assessment, Learning Environment, Science, TVET & Higher Education, Stakeholder Engagement and Education Financing.
He noted that the books are crucial to building the capacities and enhancing learning outcomes for primary and secondary students at all levels. He said CAI will partner with schools with capacities to setup reading rooms (libraries) and beneficial schools would be effectively monitored to ensure students are making maximum use of the contemporary learning tools.
Bishop Brown stated that textbooks were made available to Church Aid Incorporated through “Books for Africa”, an International organization with a mission to end the book famine in Africa and creating a culture of literacy and providing the tools of empowerment to the next generation of parents, teachers, and leaders in Africa.
Since 1988, he disclosed, the organization remains the largest shipper of donated text and library books to the African continent, shipping over 41 million books to 53 different countries.
Bishop Brown said through the partnership, interested schools will fill-in commitment and performance forms to avoid waste and abuse of the essential learning materials.
The Church Aid Incorporated boss concluded by urging the Ministry of Education to setup regional libraries in at least seven counties to compare students cover a reading benchmark to be captured within the national curriculum before graduating from high school.
He said such measures would significantly improve reading, writing and comprehension in the education system.
