RESIDENTIAL VOCATIONAL SCHOOL
A home and a vocational training center for vulnerable teenage mothers to continue their education and rebuild their lives.
According to the non-profit Kamerungo, one in four girls in Cameroon becomes pregnant and 70% of these women live in extreme poverty, with many surviving on less than $1 per day while struggling to care for themselves and their children. In Cameroon, a girl’s pregnancy comes with a strong social stigma that makes it common for families to cast the girl out of her home.
Our organization, Educate Young Girls, seeks to break this cycle of poverty by providing vocational training and safe housing for teenage mothers and their children.
DESCRIPTION
A home, a community, a Vocational School
Our goal in 2025 is to raise funds to build a shelter for teenage mothers where they can receive both vocational and literacy training. We see the combination of a supportive home together with education as especially efficient for meeting the needs of these young women. The residential shelter will include cooperative child care that allows young women to pursue education, together with guidance by older women and training in life skills as needed.
The funds will be used in Nkondjock, a village in Cameroon, due to the high number of teenage mothers in need of support in the area. Additionally, we have successfully conducted a pilot program in this region and have already secured the land for the shelter’s construction.
The design for the shelter includes twenty-five double rooms for housing fifty young women and their small children. A communal kitchen and seating area will be shared, along with classroom areas and computer stations. The grounds of the shelter will include community gardens and facilities for livestock.
What a year in our program will look like?
To start, we will offer teenage mothers agricultural training that covers crop selection and farming business management. A central element of this training is hands-on experience, where each participant will manage a plot of land and practice the full farming process, including planting, harvesting, selling produce, and calculating profits. Our program will include literacy classes to improve their reading and writing skills, vital for personal and professional development. We will also provide teenage mothers with reproductive education and free contraception to tackle teenage pregnancies, expecting they will assist in mentoring other girls on reproductive health and prevention.
After the year-long training, we will provide a microloan to start their business and offer a year of follow-up support. By the program’s end, teenage mothers will be literate, financially stable, and capable of caring for themselves and their children. They will also have an extended network of women from the program to rely upon.
ROJECT IMPACT
Once built, the shelter in the Nkondjock village will provide residential education to 50 teenage mothers a year and provide their children as well with shelter. However, it will also have the capacity to educate another 50 to 100 non-residential students in the classrooms and/or agricultural facilities. This means impacting over 150 families per year. We will assess the educational needs of the surrounding community and tailor our offerings to what is needed. Thus, the single shelter could provide varying levels of education to a large number of teenage mothers.
HOW CAN YOU SUPPORT
A Chance to Leave a Legacy and name a Building
We have already acquired the land. According to an estimate by Mr. Achille KUE of DPLG Architects in Bafoussam, Cameroon, the cost of constructing the residence alone is $151,000 USD. Including a 25% contingency to cover potential overruns, our fundraising goal is set at $190,000 by December 2025.
What Your Gift Can Do
- $200 — Furnish one dormitory room with a bed and a mattress.
- $500 — Cover labor costs to build a room by employing local workers.
- $1,000 — Purchase bricks and cement to build a classroom.
- $2,000 — Fully equip and furnish 10 dormitory rooms.
- $5,000 — Build and furnish an entire classroom.
- $5,000+ — Name a room, classroom, or hall in honor or remembrance of yourself or a loved one, leaving a lasting legacy of love and dignity.
