Grand Kru County is set to embark on an aggressive countywide campaign to identify and enroll 8,800 out-of-school children as part of the government’s Back to My Classroom (BTMC) Campaign.
The target was announced Friday by BTMC National Coordinator Dr. Daniel Henry Smith following a two-day stakeholders’ engagement meeting at Barclayville Central High School.
Dr. Smith said the campaign is intended to reach children who have been left outside the formal education system, including school dropouts, children living with disabilities, and children facing other barriers to accessing education.
He noted that Grand Kru is among six additional counties being challenged to achieve higher recruitment figures, urging local stakeholders to intensify community-level mobilization.
To drive the initiative, a County BTMC Secretariat Committee has been constituted, bringing together key actors from government, civil society, the media, youth structures, and community leadership.
The committee includes representatives of the Ministries of Education, Health and Gender, civil society organizations, the media, the Office of the District Commissioner, the Children’s Forum, the County Youth leadership, and other stakeholders.
Dr. Smith said the committee must ensure that recruitment is conducted transparently and that no eligible child is excluded because of disability, social status, gender, or other circumstances.
Representing Grand Kru County Superintendent Alexander Wiah, officials assured the national BTMC team of the county’s commitment to achieving the 8,800 target.
Wiah pledged the county administration’s support for the recruitment exercise and called for strong collaboration among stakeholders to ensure that children identified during the campaign are effectively connected to schools.
Meanwhile, Sarah Kopeh, Administrative Assistant in the Office of the District Education Officer and representative of the County BTMC Secretariat Chair, welcomed the initiative and pledged the committee’s full participation.
Kopeh said the committee will take the campaign into communities across Grand Kru, stressing that the recruitment process will be conducted fairly and inclusively.
With the stakeholders’ engagement now concluded, attention shifts to community mobilization, identification, enrollment, and retention as Grand Kru begins its push to return thousands of children to school.
