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My nurse experience and education allowed me to prepare two first aid kits for the school prior to coming as a volunteer. As I worked alongside local volunteers, we both gained valuable experience.
My first experience volunteering with KNEF was in 2007. At this time KNEF was sponsoring students who could not pay school fees and doing what they could to improve education through helping existing schools in the community of Offuman.
Prior to coming I helped out with ordering and shipping school supplies for the local children. I was able to travel and help with distributing the donations and meeting the people. I had an amazing experience with the organization while it was just at its very beginning phase of starting out. They were starting some construction to have a place to stay inside the town and to store shipped goods to distribute in a timely way.
At this time, we stayed in the nearest hotel in the closest city, Techiman and drove into Offuman daily. I was able to share some basic health information with the local people using my background as a nurse and helped out when I could. I found many children suffering from ringworm and worked to educate parents on the importance of drinking and using clean water.
I especially found the hotel staff, the general population and the KNEF staff to be very friendly and helpful. I especially enjoyed the happy faces of the children and community of Offuman.
Sharing meals and learning about a new culture was also very interesting. When it was time to go, I looked forward to coming again.
After returning from my trip, I continued to volunteer for KNEF helping them to ship school supplies, desks, chairs and other educational materials from Hong Kong.
It took me several years before I had the chance to return to Ghana. On this trip KNEF had just opened their own school in Offuman. Harvest Education Complex. I was very impressed to see how far KNEF had progressed in this time.
They had completed a house for volunteers and some paid staff to live in within the town of
Offuman and we were all able to stay there. It was clean and comfortable. It was also more convenient as we did not have to go into the hotel in the city daily.
As a volunteer this time, prior to coming they asked me to prepare two first aid kits for the school again, using my education and nursing experience. I also continued to give some basic health information to the parents and general community of Offuman while I was there. I was asked to prepare all of this in advance of my trip.
The school also had their grand opening ceremony while I was there and I helped with the preparation for this lovely happy event.
One of my tasks was to build a fun obstacle course for the students to play in and have races using whatever materials that were available. I knew in advance that I would be doing this and brought along a few things in my suitcase for the task. I worked alongside some local
volunteers and we both learned from each other that day. The children had so much fun and it was worth all the effort.
I appreciated that KNEF took my job, education and skills and interests into consideration when curating my tasks and my trip in general.
Each of my volunteering experiences in Ghana were less than three weeks, not including the preparation time in Hong Kong such as preparing first aid kits as my donation. It should be noted that a yellow fever vaccination is required to enter Ghana and should be carried in your passport for viewing on arrival. Ghana also needs a tourist visa for most countries, but the staff of KNEF were able to help greatly. Both of my trips were before COVID so new vaccinations maybe required.
It is also advised to take precautions for malaria. I did take the weekly pills for prevention and they worked fine for me, although some people complain of side effects.
On my second trip, KNEF was able to supply a house for us to stay in. It is very comfortable, but it should be noted that water and electricity in Ghana come and go randomly. They were
able to dig a well at the school so they do have water access.
You can surprisingly be connected to the internet in the village (providing you can charge your devices). They are working on getting solar power to the school so that may also be soon resolved.
I fully enjoyed both my trips to Ghana and look forward to volunteering for KNEF again in the future. I hope you will too.
To Volunteer at KNEF Ghana, please visit our volunteer page.
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