Lauren Hu's Roughley Trust Gap Year Grant report 2024

Lauren Hu's report

In September 2023 I arrived at the busy capital of Accra in Ghana with seven other people who I would spend a year with. We travelled for another three and a half hours away from the fast-paced capital to small villages; mine being Agorweme.

Ruby, my volunteer partner, and I were warmly greeted and introduced to the family who lived next door, who also owned the house we lived in. Their support and friendship would become an invaluable part of our experience. Ghanaian people are well known for being friendly and welcoming, and the community did their best to make us feel welcomed throughout the year.

We started Agorweme Basic school in October at the start of the term. It was a basic set up, with one classroom per year group holding desks, a blackboard and cupboard. The students would carry one pen and one pencil, holding up the class if these went missing (often hidden by another student as a joke).

The first week was checking report cards from the previous year, containing grades and comments from their teacher to check they were able to be 'promoted' into the year above. We were shocked at the comments, most of them calling the students 'lazy', 'dull' and other harsh insults. Ruby and I were given some report cards and asked to copy the comments from the previous term to the new term highlighting the lack of care taken by some teachers, who were underpaid and often had multiple jobs in order to pay for accommodation and food.

We quickly settled into school. I was in Class 6 with a teacher called Madam Abigail and Ruby was in Class 5. I would assist with English, Maths and Science. The level of English was very good so the main focus would be on grammar and reading comprehension, following a curriculum fairly similar to one we would see in a British school. Ruby and I also taught PE together, amalgamating our classes each week. The students' hardworking and cheerful attitude impressed me and in time I grew to learn their personalities and which subjects different students would need help with. There was very little knowledge on learning disorders and most students were instead labelled as lazy, so I would often spend more time in the class with a specific student explaining the subject.

Reading club

After school on Tuesday, we would run reading club from 2pm to 3pm using books donated from previous volunteers. This was a great opportunity to encourage students to read books, which were almost impossible to find where we lived.

Sometimes the classroom would be so hot we would move out the desks and read outside. Students would take their own book, and we would listen to each student individually read out loud when we came to them.

Netball club

On Thursday we ran netball club. The students had never done this before and there was no netball court, so we started teaching passing, moving and the other basic rules of the game. The students caught on very quickly and it was a lot of fun releasing some energy after a day of sitting in a classroom. It was also a great step to get more female students out playing a sport, as football would generally be dominated by the male students.

The girls would also have many more chores at home, as they were expected to cook, clean and look after young siblings. So having a club set up within the school allowed them to stay longer and play sport like the boys did every day. At the end of the year, we took them on a school trip to A.A. FIA school where some of our fellow volunteers worked to play a friendly match at their school, which had a netball court. This was a lot of fun and it was incredible to see how much our students had improved from the start of the year.

Harsh school discipline

Although school life was overall very enjoyable and rewarding it could also be very challenging. Corporal punishment was freely given for the smallest of infractions (despite being illegal) including getting a question wrong in class or sometimes just if a teacher was frustrated.

The severity and clear abuse within the school led us to telling the school in January that it would have to stop, or we would leave to a new school. This led to the school stopping most forms of corporal punishment for the remainder of the term. But it highlighted to us the lack of training within Ghana for most teachers on the problems of corporal punishment and other means by which to discipline students.

Back in our home, Cecelia, the woman who lived next door taught us how to cook traditional Ghanaian cuisine including fufu and banku. The compound we lived in had a lovely community feel with everyone working together to raise the children, prepare and package groundnuts to sell at the market and help each other with any problems they had.

Local celebrations

We felt privileged to be able to see different celebrations and community events within our village. Ghanaian funerals are a celebration of life, so although there would be sadness, there would also be dancing and appreciation for the person's life and what they achieved. The body of the person would be dressed up in traditional dress and placed in a tent or room so people could pay their respects.

We also attended the celebration of a new chief of Agorweme. This was a day of dancing, singing and music. Everyone dressed in their traditional cloth and we learnt how to do the traditional dance. This was a very important day as the chief is an important person in the peaceful running of a village, and they will often run meetings with the elders of the village if there is a disagreement or problem.

Travelling in the holidays

During the holidays we had opportunities to widely travel round the country as well as Togo and Benin. We were able to travel to Mole National Park and see a variety of awesome animals including elephants and crocodiles.

Ghana has a long and tumultuous history, and we had tours of Cape Coast Castle and Elmina Castle, where millions of slaves had been kept in inhumane conditions before being shipped to other continents.

Amazing opportunity

Overall, my year away was hugely enjoyable and it was an amazing opportunity to live long-term in another country and culture. I have made long-lasting connections with Cecelia and her family and have some incredible memories of Ghana to share with my family and friends.

Teaching in Class 6 (ages 11 to 13)

The school building. The classrooms were basic with desks and chairs and a blackboard that often needed another coat of paint

Learning to prepare and cook local dishes. This is pounding fufu

Washing clothes and sheets