Vision Statement: Play and Learn hopes to help eradicate poverty through sports, academic education, and mentorship in not only Ghana but Africa at large.

Mission Statement: Play and Learn seeks to empower the youth of Ghana through combining athletics, academics, and professional mentorship to develop skills needed to become the future leaders of our world.

History

The idea of Play and Learn Foundation was identified, conceptualized and developed in August 2013; when its current Executive Director, Nana Kwasi Ohene, was pursuing his MBA in Marketing Program at the University of Ghana Business School.  During this time Mr. Ohene coached and organized football league competitions for the residents of the University of Ghana’s International Students Hostel (at the University’s Ajax Park. At training sessions, the children from the surrounding areas, Okpongolo, Shiashie, Bawlashie and Madina, would gather around and watch training drills and games being played in awe and desire to play. Out of the strong desire to learn about the children, an interaction was initiated between Mr. Ohene and the children.

After getting to know many of these children, it was clear that many were from deprived homes and lacked basic skills in areas such as communication, comprehension, and critical thinking. After school, many children had obligations to sell provisions and food on the streets to generate income and were unable to participate in sports or after school programs. The Ghana Statistical Service reports that 25% of children between the ages of five and seventeen are involved in child labor.

Play and Learn seeks to target children under similar circumstances by using education and participation in sports to develop leaders in the various local communities in Ghana and beyond. Rather than focusing entirely on sports, the organization chooses to develop a variety of skills to create leaders and problem solvers in local communities.

Our Model: Learn and Lead

The Play and Learn Foundation believes that a strong basic education and the development of soft skills is not strongly emphasized in most Ghanaian schools. It is the organization’s goal to provide a space where local students are provided with a safe environment to build these skills through problem solving, creativity, and sports.

Play and Learn uses a 3-tiered “Learn and Lead” approach to build well-rounded leaders in their communities: mentorship, sports, and academics. By modeling Play and Learn in this way, the organization seeks to provide children with a support system that cares not only about their current well being, but the strength and potential in their future.

Sports

Football is the force that transcends tribal divisions, language, age, and other cultural divides. At Play and Learn, children are divided by age group and assigned a coach. These coaches are members of the Okpongolo community who have a passion for football and a strong desire to help the children of Play and Learn develop their own skills. These coaches offer their services for the greater good of helping create a program that prevents these children from wandering on the streets, and promotes the health and wellbeing of children in the greater Accra region.

Mentorship

The Organization has recently implemented our new “Nkonsonkonson Mentor Program.” This initiative seeks to pair children with mentors over the course of 4 months to a year. The mentor is required to meet up weekly with the mentee to establish a strong relationship that fosters learning through the exchange of wisdom, experiences, guidance and direction. This Program provides a consistent and meaningful interaction for both the mentor and mentee, and allows both parties to learn and grow from one another over the course of several months.

Academics

Volunteer teachers have three days in the week to meet the designated kids they are supposed to tutor after school from 3pm to 5.30pm. Learning activities are supposed to be fun sessions, where lessons are taught through games, debates, creative and innovative activities that trigger brainstorming, curiosity and critical thinking within the children. Volunteers are given the independence to come up with their own unique ways of delivering their planned lessons. The ratio of children to each teacher ranges from 1:5 to 1: 8, allowing volunteer teachers to get to know the strengths, weaknesses and uniqueness of each student.

Development Plan  

Two Year Objectives

Partnerships

Play and Learn desires to seek further partnership with organizations such as the Sports Directorate in the University of Ghana (UG), UG Student Representation Council, UG Social Work Department, UG International Program, Ghana Football Association, Ministry of Youth and Sports, Ministry of Education, other NGO’s, embassies, individuals, corporate sponsors, and schools both local and international. These partnerships are valuable, and allow for the long-term financial stability of the organization.

Transportation

Play and Learn is looking to fund the purchase of a fourteen-passenger bus. Transportation is necessary to engage students beyond the football field or classroom, and into other areas in the Accra region. Play and Learn would like to increase community engagement by providing students the opportunity to experience different museums, workplaces, and locations they may not ordinarily experience. The organization feels that these experiences allow children to see new opportunity in their own lives, to grow as individuals, and set goals beyond secondary school.

Mobile Library

Though Play and Learn currently offers facilitated academic programming, the organization wishes to instill a desire in children to be lifelong learners through the promotion of literacy and reading. Play and Learn would like to provide a mobile library to children involved with the organization to provide affordable and convenient access to books. These books will have a wide-range of levels to accommodate the varying skill levels of our many students.

Media Launch

Play and Learn is expanding its online presence, and would like to kick things off with a bang! To celebrate the kick-off of Play and Learn’s website, the organization would like to begin with a fundraising campaign for upcoming projects. The promotion of this fundraiser will raise website traffic and serve to better promote the organization on both a local and international scale.

Awards and Achievements

• Play and Learn recently received a seed grant from the Pollination Project which is an NGO California to help us run our current programs.

• Featured in the Huffington Post and the USAC blog post as well both Internationally recognized sites.

• Recent successful Go Fund me campaign raising 3,350 dollars for scholarships, school bags and various needs and materials for the children and the organization itself.

• Initiated a recent girls’ empowerment program dubbed “The Yaa Asantewaa Princesses” Aimed at getting more girls into the program, and providing the same platform to strive for excellence.

• The establishment of the PAL U.S.A. and Norway chapters are in its final stages of registration. These chapters will help the organization with fundraising, networking and finding more donor partners and resources needed to achieve our vision.