When I turned 6, I did not consider myself a kid anymore . Ever since, I saw the world from a different angle. I started dedicating 2 hours per day to my English story book collection. It was called “The Wild Thornberry”. I used to spend hours pinned to my desk reading and writing. I was fascinated by the accent and the sound of the letters of the new language I was learning; English, it was. The biggest question I was constantly asked is “ Are you crazy adding extra study hours to your schedule?” My answer was, “ I don’t think I can be more reasonable.” “Those who know nothing of foreign...

I grew up in a house where an interesting story has been told many times. “When prince charming (your dad) came to steal the heart of my little princess (your mom)” my grandfather starts, with a smile on his face and a glowing tear on his cheek. “Your mom was preparing to harvest the fruit of 12 years of constant hard work, sleepless nights and the perseverance to succeed” he continues. With his hand on my shoulder and a warm voice he adds: “I stood solid and said firmly that no man shall marry my daughter until she celebrates her personal victory”. Which is graduation, he explains. At that...

In Africa, I mean Liberia, they call me the future leader but I ask, when is the future? At 18, young, energetic; At 94, weak and cripple? Ohh no! Wait! Am I? For what have they prepared me? To face a future as dark as a Vantablack My hope has been crushed as my future seems blurry Hopeless, yes, worthless they made me feel I feel a future filled with empty hopes of uncertainty Within me lies the feelings full of empty regrets For long I have been drenched in a hopeless dilemma They care not about my pain, but their greed Their pleasure lies within their immature mind They appear gloomy, but...

Don't the accept the status quo what's going on now will not define the future you! you're going to write the future don't be contended because you're not affected be involved because you care for the future's smile Don't be like them, be different, and stand!

How we can start communicating Science effectively… We all know that scientific discoveries and their practical applications, be it in the fields of medicine, economics, technology etc. promote industrial and social development and that research, innovation and new technologies to a large extent can influence and determine economic, social, political and even ethical dimensions of modern societies. This presupposes that scientific advances and findings have to be communicated to the grand public in both an accurate and understandable way ensuring that the information reaches the people. But...

Splendid books deserve to be shared, just like fantastic movies or music. I have translated excerpts in Chinese from books and poems to English. They are treasures that belong to the world, and I don’t want to see them trammeled by the scopes of language. A good piece of translation is part of the creative process, not a mechanical exercise that is easily done with a computer. A computer can translate words, but they can't translate feelings. Computer-generated translations can be grammatically correct, but lack imagination. When we start to draw the images that hide in our head and lead them...

My name is Musah Ajara, I am 15 years old and I come from Gbimsi, in Ghana. In 2018, my parents told me to stop schooling because they are poor and do not have money. Then I replied to them that, even if they do not have money for my school, I will continue to go to school. The first term examination was approaching and the school requested we pay for the cost of examination fee. All my class mates paid but I could not. My teachers then asked me why I had not paid my examination fee and I told them about my situation. I was allowed to take my exams and I placed first in the exams and I was...

My name is Nancy Enyonam Addrah and I'm a 23 years mother from Avee, in the Volta region of Ghana, and I attend Social Welfare Vocational Training Centre. I believe that girls who have children should not give up! They should go to school and achieve their dreams. I never listened to what people had to tell me in school, whether good or bad, for that reason nobody liked me. I completed Junior high school with a good grade. After completing school, there was no money to continue my education. I was not occupied at home, so I became curious. As we say, ‘curiosity killed the cat’. I had been...

My name is Adam Safiya, I'm 17 and I come from Gbimsi, in the West Mamprusi Municipal of the North East region of Ghana. I want to live in a world where girls are also allowed to go to school and no woman is maltreated! My parents celebrated me when I passed my Basic Education Certificate Examination, and they showed me that they were proud of me. I decided that I will never let them down, but take my studies seriously to become someone prominent in the future. I have taken my education seriously at the secondary school level as well, for if I want to succeed someday, I must understand that...

READING – what’s the very first thing that comes to our mind on hearing this word? Being able to comprehend what a penman wants to convey? Or just having the flair to spell out a word precisely without delving deep into its message? In taking into account either of these, we often tend to disregard the fact that reading is not as facile as it seems to be. There are tens of millions of people in the world, especially in developing countries like India where this fundamentally basic human right (more specifically education) is still considered to be a privilege. Although the central authorities...

It's 14th of February and all the stores are filled with red and pink candy, balloons, flowers, and teddy bears. It's that time of the year when we are celebrating love, but everything is not a bed of roses. Valentines' day is about love, but it's also about having a safe, healthy, emotional and physical relationship with someone. It's therefore VERY important to discuss consent and promoting a Consent culture which “is a culture in which asking for consent is normalized and condoned in popular culture [and] believing that you and your partner(s) have the right over your own bodily autonomies...

How to not only pass but master your exams... My teachers have always told me to “study hard!” And for “at least” 1.5 hours per higher level subject a day. I have hated it when they said this. It always sounded as if school should have the greatest priority. Yes school was important for me as I was aiming to study medicine and yes I wanted good grades but I also wanted a life outside of school and free time. So I have worked with my own concept … I have not studied hard but smart. I want to share some of my tips with you! Just in advance: also if the tips might sound a bit nerdy, I am...

My name is Deborah Kponkpongli, I am 19-year-old mother from Bole, in Ghana, and I want to go back to school. I also want to ensure that my daughter stays in school to achieve her aims. It is my hope that other girls who have dropped out of school due to teenage pregnancy will continue their education. I wrote a short letter to my 13-month old daughter: Dear Child, I got pregnant because I did not have information about contraceptives or how to protect myself. I was distracted and did not focus on my education. I was in Junior High School and about to write my Basic Education Certificate...

My name is Kipo Sophia, I am 19-year-old student of Tinga Senior Technical school, in Ghana. My hope is that girl education will be taken seriously, because we cannot develop our communities without the contribution of women. In 2016, I completed Junior High School and gained admission to further my education in the secondary level, but my parents had different plans for me. Despite knowing that my dream was to become a teacher, they told me to get a job and start working instead. I was 15 years old at the time. I tried to explain but they told me they wouldn't waste their money on my...

I assume that most of you guys already know about the entrance tests for college, the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) and the American College Testing (ACT). Standardizing tests have ignited a national debate in the last few years, and many parents feel understandably concerned about their children being judged on the basic tests that don’t seem to correlate with actual learning or with successful college and career outcomes. As a senior in high school who has been experiencing high school enough to state this: I strongly believe that standardized tests are unnecessary for students and it...

“I don’t care if you know things! I want you to understand them!” That is what my anatomy university lecturer told us in one of our last lectures before exams. This sentence has struck me and has provoked some critical thinking about the structure of the subject that I am studying and the value of assessments. I started studying medicine last October and have completed my first stressful and, at the same time, exciting semester. I had to adjust to university structures and processes, while being overwhelmed with information from a whole range of different subjects; Physics, Chemistry, Biology...

The last time I read for leisure was three or four days ago. I can’t remember the second to last time I opened a book for the pure sake of inhaling its scent, of imbibing the voices of people far removed from my life, of feeling the day’s stress leak into the pages. The book was My Sister’s Keeper—a powerful, devastating novel by Jodi Picoult. I had reread it a while ago, but hadn’t touched the book ever since. My Sister’s Keeper describes the complicated lives of seven related characters, and subtly revolves around Kate Fitzgerald, a youngster diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer. In...

“Poetry is when an emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words” - Robert Frost, a renowned American poet Learning English can be an intimidating task, courtesy of the unyielding grammatical and syntactical rules, as well as the daunting principles of sentence formation and punctuation. What adds to this unbending image is the rigid method in which this language is taught in schools—as an endless series of rules meant to be obeyed when one pens down thoughts and beliefs. But sometimes, following standard axioms can be a hindrance to a student’s creativity. After all, scores of...

In a report by the World Bank Group (2018), 10 countries had a significant number of migrant children who had been living without their parents. Such kind of migration is usually encapsulated as internal migration of children i.e. is the movement of the children within national boundaries. While many organisations have committed their resources and energies towards the cause, which requires our special attention, howsoever Salam Balak Trust is one name which always remains at the top of the list. They have pioneered in aspects of inclusion and providing basic education to migrant children...