Program areas at COFA
King kama lunches and teacher stipends, mile 91 building, adama school supplies:providing needed lunches for students at the king kama school plus teacher stipends and needed school supplies.
Growing family prosperitynow in its second year, this12-month agricultural program aims to provide basic farming supplies and guidance to households in rural communities, to enable families to grow crops and thereby provide food for themselves and sell the surplus to produce income. All supplies and salaries for the project manager, a trained agronomist, and extension workers are funded by Cofa. Participants receive field training from the project staff to grow rice, groundnuts, cucumbers, peppers, okra, cassava, and potatoes. In addition, each family receives a pair of goats and chickens. Harvests and seed banking, for future crops, take place over the course of the year. The first "class" of 30 families completed their first year and are on the path to self-sufficiency. They are not being supported financially by Cofa, but are still receiving regular visits from staff and advice. All 30 families were able to improve their lives by sending children to school, purchasing more land to farm, paying off debts, improving their homes, etc. The second class of 25 families have already begun their journey. A new program of composting to produce fertilizer is being introduced to All 55 families in 2024, which should reduce dependence on chemical fertilizer. A pilot program to process cassava root is being established in 3 villages.
Nourishing young minds and bodiesthis month-long school and feeding program operates during july-august, when food supplies are lowest and many people subsist on a single meal each day, and when the regular schools are closed. Initiated in 2020 in four schools and paid for privately by Cofa's founder and a gofundme campaign, in 2022 it received foundation funding to support classroom teaching and provide daily lunch in 11 schools in the lunsar region for more than 2,500 primary- and secondary-school students. The program provides a month's salary to the teachers and the local women who prepare the daily lunch. The project also supports local young men and women, previously unemployed, who grow the rice used for meals, on land rented by Cofa.
Bike librariesin sierra leone, girls are at greater risk for dropping out of school, and one reason is the difficulty in getting to school. There is no transport offered, and in rural areas, it can be more than five miles each way. In the past 10 years, the village bike project has established "bike libraries" at a number of schools, focusing mainly on girls, to facilitate their attendance. Cofa is teaming with the village bike project to support and expand the vbp's existing bike libraries into the rural port loko district, and to offer bikes to both boys and girls who need them.
Mph for abdul kamaraabdul kamara, who has worked with Cofa projects since they began, has a bachelor's degree in public health and the desire to further his public health education. Cofa has funded his studies for a master of public health degree at the freetown campus of njala university. The program is run as an intensive weekend program, whereby students continue to work during the week and come to freetown to study saturdays and sundays.
Bachelor's degree for adama sesaycofa began supporting adama, an orphan, through her secondary education at edunations school in rokassa. She graduated with honors in 2023 and has now enrolled in the university of makeni. Cofa has committed to supporting her through her degree. She is also working at a woman-owned bike shop supported by karim kamara.