Blama Town, Gbarpolu County – The esteemed Catholic nun, Sister Mary Laurene Browne has taken her reading program to rural Liberia to beef up the reading skills of students.
Report by Willie N. Tokpah – [email protected]
The program has been extended to Nyaforta Public School in Gbarpolu County and with the provision of a modern reading room for students in that area.
The reading room, estimated at US$10,000, was constructed at the Nyaforta Public School in Blama Town, Gbarpolu County as a contribution from the Bishop John Collins Teachers College.
The project is an initiative by students attending the Spiritan Academy and aimed at improving the reading skills of students attending the Nyaforta Public School.
The reading room project is said to be the first of its kind to be established at the school for students and was dedicated on Monday, April 24 by the President of Stella Maris Polytechnic, Sis. Mary Laurene Browne.
During the dedication, Sister Browne said the dedication of the reading room is due to the quest for improved reading skills in Liberia.
According to her, education plays a cardinal role in the development of any nation and should not be overlooked.
“Education is so important and if you can read, you can do practically anything, you can go anywhere. So we learn a lot by reading,” she said.
She named the reading room project as coordination between the Spiritan Academy and Nyaforta Public School for the betterment of both institutions.
According to her, a reading room has been constructed for the students of Nyaforta through the kind gesture of students from Spiritan.
She informed the gathering that the funds used to construct the reading room in Nyaforta came from students of Spiritan, especially seven graders who helped with LD$17,000.
“Each class room has a box and the children put in some of their recess every day they come to school. The first thing we thought of is to build a reading room for Nyaforta Public School.”