Nwankem Benevolent Foundation, Inc

Worldwide, in low-resourced countries, children with disabilities lack access to education. In spite of many obstacles, the St. Rita Foundation Nursery and Primary Inclusive School opened its doors inclusively to all children in Cameroon. However, the teachers were not prepared to serve their Students With Disabilities (SWDs). The innovative St Rita’s Professional Development Academy (SRPDA) created a virtual bridge between experts in the US and Cameroon to bring teachers the skills to meet the needs of their SWD. The SRPDA model could elevate other schools in under-resourced areas to provide inclusive education for all.

 The Prize would fund:

1.  The amplification of the SRPDA model in additional schools. Other possible partners in this phase exist in the Southwest Region of Cameroon and other countries in Africa.

2.  Improved infrastructure, including video conferencing, and additional computer technology. 

3.  Adequate educational materials for both the teachers and SWDs, both technical and non-technical.

4.  The expansion of curricula to address advanced special education topics.

5.  The extension of programs to engage community leaders, businesses and families to serve the life-long needs of individuals with special needs and address attitudes surrounding SWDs and their capacity to make contributions to their communities and society.

Dr. Mbeseha established the non-profit Nwankem Benevolent Foundation Inc. to galvanize resources and build educational programs for the needs of all children, especially those excluded from existing schools. The St. Rita Foundation Nursery and Primary Inclusive School is the primary initiative of the Foundation. Dr. Mbeseha’s passion in starting an inclusive school grew from her own experience with her son’s learning disabilities, which prevented his academic success. Thus, St. Rita was envisioned as an inclusive school to serve others like him. 

Dr. Mbeseha soon realized that the school’s teachers were unprepared for instructing SWDs, leading to frustrated teachers and reduced student learning. Margaret then conceived of the SRPDA to connect content domain experts in the US with the teachers of St. Rita.

Through a multimodal approach, SRPDA supports the teachers to identify and implement the most effective strategies to serve each child. By providing teachers access to specialized course content and regular faculty-teacher meetings, SRPDA improved the education of SWDs at St. Rita. 

Dr. Mbeseha’s envisions that SRPDA can be made available to other schools and serve as the basis for increased awareness of the potential of individuals living with disabilities throughout Cameroon as well as the rest of Africa.

UNICEF’s ‘State of the World’s Children: Children with Disabilities’ reported that one in twenty children, aged 14 or younger, live with a disability. School inclusion is critical in reducing the vulnerability of these individuals to discrimination, exclusion and abuse.

Due to current educational policies, individuals with disabilities are denied access to education at all levels, a short-sighted approach preventing some children from becoming productive members of society. Additionally, teachers are not trained to be special educators and are ill-equipped to serve the needs of Students With Disabilities (SWDs).

St. Rita’s enrollment averaged an annual increase of 12.6% for each of the last 8 years, increasing SWDs. This indicated a community need for such a school. This increase placed an additional burden on teachers to help students who require specialized teaching.

SRPDA educated teachers of St. Rita in Special Education, Physical Therapy, Occupational Therapy, and Speech Therapy. Our approach created a teacher education program that built upon teacher-identified needs, and solved problems through ongoing interaction of practitioner content experts in the US, with teachers serving SWDs. A critical success factor was the identification of a local lead teacher who served to coordinate and facilitate the delivery of SRPDA.

The needs of children in an undeveloped area propelled change and innovation. Connecting teachers in Buea with content expertise and support of faculty/practitioners in the US required the development of a unique delivery system using synchronous /asynchronous technologies. SRPDA broke the barriers of time and geography through a novel instructional design. A hallmark of the SRPDA model is establishing local ownership, management and engagement in the program.

Foremost, the course content addresses a recognized instructional gap in Cameroon for serving SWDs. SRPDA materials are distributed under a Creative Commons License making them public open source content.

Secondly, the instructional design model represents an adaptable arrangement of course content. 

Hybrid Independent Learning/Cohort-based: 

1. Teachers access course materials independently (Moodle).

2. Teachers meet weekly with a local facilitator to share progress notes/ apply course content (face-to-face).

3. Lesson assignments posted to WhatsApp receive feedback from faculty in the US.

4. Monthly faculty-teacher Zoom meetings brainstorm “case studies” of challenging students. The team creates and modifies learning strategies for SWDs.

Finally, this model efficiently uses expert faculty’s time while maximizing teacher participation. It addresses teachers’ limited access to reliable electricity and internet bandwidth, and can be replicated to serve other schools requiring distributed resources.

Fundamentally, SRPDA is focused on improving the lives of children through increasing teacher development in special education and related services.

The teachers, when provided appropriate knowledge and skills, increased the abilities of the children to participate in all aspects of a meaningful life.

Given support, teachers then solve novel problems for students with learning challenges. Providing effective education for SWDs is key to enabling children to transition to independent adulthood and give back to the community. The community of parents, students, and teachers have taken ownership of this program, perpetuating further growth.

The teachers report that they can identify improvements in the children’s behaviors, attitudes and attention due to the techniques presented in SRPDA. Parents indicate that the course content helps them better understand and respond to the needs of their child. The teachers also report more confidence and willingness to help each other when working with a SWD. This cycle of progress continues to build from year to year.

 Clearly this locally built, adaptive model is sustainable and beneficial for the entire community. The potential exists for the SRPDA model to expand to other schools and agencies throughout Africa with low risk and high benefit for families and communities.