Monrovia – The Minister of Education, Professor Ansu Sonii, has expressed the profound thanks and appreciation of the Liberian people to the Government and People of the United States for the 12th Grader Cash Stipend program funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
Under the program, about 42,000 12th graders from all 15 counties of Liberia who qualified to sit the West African Senior School Certificate Examinations were eligible for a stipend of US$50 (LD 10,000) to help them with some of the expenses associated with preparing for and sitting the Exams, including the costs of transportation to and from school, as well as their daily food and other basic needs.
Speaking at a program held at the Ministry of Education on Friday to recognize the successes of the stipend program, Minister Sonii described it as a “just on time and an unanticipated gift from the American people,” which helped “saved students as well as their parents’ much-needed resources which is critical in these unprecedented times.”
Students from various parts of Liberia who sat the Exams, administered from August 17 to September 2, attended the ceremony to recognize and celebrate the successes of the USAID funded 12th grader cash stipend initiative. Parents and teachers’ representatives also attended the ceremony. Students, parents, and teachers who spoke during the ceremony, thanked the U.S. Government for the stipend program, which they said greatly helped students and their families cope with some of the economic constraints caused by COVID-19.
USAID/Liberia Mission Director, Sara Walter, said the cash stipend transfer program was part of the broader United Government COVID-19 assistance to Liberia. She described the initiative as another testament to “how COVID has forced the Mission to quicken its pace and creatively adapt its programming to help Liberia effectively respond” to secondary impacts of COVID-19 and other challenges resulting from the disease, noting that “the stipend program specifically sought to help 12th graders deal with the additional challenges associated with preparing for the exams, and all the available evidence strongly suggests that we hit the mark here.”