Each applicant should:

• Be a first-year student in a public university.

• Have applied for financial aid in their university.

• Household family income should be less than $150 per month.

• Get a maximum number of A’s in their standardized West Africa Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (WASSCE) in English, Maths, Science, and Social Studies. 

• Submit a 500-word essay detailing why they should be selected for the scholarship program. They will be expected to display a remarkable command of the English language, as they express what the scholarship would mean to them and how they want to contribute to their community with their education. 

• Students can also share any volunteering activities they have been involved in and how that has shaped their experience and outlook on life.

 

• In Ghana, only 17% of high school graduates enroll in a university because of the prohibitive cost of a college education. Most of the students who enroll do manual labor to pay their way through college. The most disadvantaged are children from rural Ghana and girls. Many families do not prioritize their daughters’ education.

 

• By selecting 2 students from each of the 16 regions of Ghana each year, and giving equal opportunities to girls, we hope to make a consistent dent in the rural-urban divide and gender gap in college enrollment and graduation in the country.

 

• Fortunate students who graduate with a secondary or tertiary degree, find that their schools and universities do not equip them with the latest skills demanded by the ever-changing market.

 

• The beneficiaries of this program will be provided internship opportunities and will take professional development courses throughout their four years in college to develop additional workforce-related skills to make them competitive in the job market. In the third year of undergraduate studies, beneficiaries will be assisted in finding full-time jobs in order to enable a smooth transition into the workforce. 

 

• They will be paired with a mentor for the first year of employment in order to support and guide them. The long-term goal for this program is to have graduates of this program become mentors for future beneficiaries. We are working to expand internship placement opportunities to sectors that are in demand and not offered.