The Special Foundation Summer School is Focused on Building Africa’s Next Generation of Leaders

The Special Foundation is a privately funded social impact organization focused on building Africa’s next set of leaders by refining their minds through education. Since 2019, the foundation has empowered less privileged, gifted African Children through education, mentorship, and leadership opportunities.

It does this through a number of programs, including the Inspire Scholarship for orphans and vulnerable children, School Builds Program, and the Special Summer School.

The annual Special Summer School provides students with academic, social, and personal enrichment opportunities. It is designed to offer the children continued and all-around capacity development, even during the holidays.

The Special Summer School covers the core subject areas, team development, and leadership skills. Reiterating the benefit of this program in the lives of young Nigerians, the founder; Seyi Akinwale, stated that;

“The summer break is an ideal time for students to gain skills and grow their social network because of the lengthy period of this holiday. The Summer School improves the literacy and critical thinking abilities of children from disadvantaged communities. Children from age 8 to 18 from low-income families benefit from the exclusive perks of our free summer program.”

This year, the program took place in Lagos and Abuja. The Special Foundation partnered with Kazachat School for the Abuja program from August 2 – 20, with over 200 children in attendance. In Lagos, the summer school activities ran from August 9th – September 10th, in partnership with Roydek School. The Lagos program had over 250 students in attendance. The program this year covered non-traditional subject areas like creative writing, public speaking, critical thinking, leadership, patriotism, national values, vocabulary building, basic ICT, and other creative skills.

In Abuja, the children were provided with books, shirts, pens, and gifts. In addition to this, the children daily received free lunch provided by donations from the Foundation. During the program, there were competitions from which students who performed outstandingly were selected for scholarship opportunities.

Joan Omodibo, a mom to one of the participants, Destiny said,

“The scholarship provided by the Foundation has really relieved me of paying school fees”.

Adebayo Adeola, a participant at the Summer School, said;

“The lessons were interesting, I learned a lot of things, the things I learned here has improved my knowledge”.

The Special Foundation is creating positive change-makers in various communities. Over the past 3 years, the foundation has offered capacity development opportunities through its Summer School Project and has offered scholarships to over 80 children from low-income homes through the Inspire Scholarship Program.