Emmanuel Lepol

S. Emmanuel Lepol, the treasurer of LEAP, is a teacher of 8th and 9th grade mathematics at Len Miller H.S. in the Salvation Army School System in Sinkor, Monrovia, where his classes average 65 children. He graduated from Lango Lippaye High School, Kakata, in 2001 and attended KRTTI, where he graduated with a C Certificate in 2002 and began teaching. Presently he is majoring in accounting and minoring in economics at African Methodist Episcopal Zion University in Monrovia. He came to LEAP training in 2004. “LEAP has modified my teaching” he says. “When I graduated from teacher training, my teaching improved.” He has two children.

Ernest Shaw

Ernest Emmanuel Shaw has been the principal of Johnsonville K-12 School since 1986. He has been a teacher since 1973. He is a graduate of KRTTI and the Liberia Baptist Theological Seminary in Paynesville.  He is the pastor of the Morning Star Baptist Church in Johnsonville and the acting executive secretary of the Liberia Baptist Missionary and Educational Convention. He was elected president of LEAP in 2004 and reelected in 2013. He has been a LEAP co-trainer since 2000. He is married and has five children. He has done mission work in Ghana, Sierra Leone and Nigeria. He says that LEAP has affected his teaching greatly and he holds periodic training for the early childhood teachers in his school and other schools in Johnsonville.

Victoria Kolleh

Victoria Kolleh, the LEAP board member for Montserrado, is an early childhood teacher at Morris American Rubber Company (MARCO) Elementary and Junior High School on Morris Farm in Lower Montserrado. She teaches nursery in a class with 105 children, ranging in age from 3 to 13. She breaks the children into groups by age and the older ones guide the younger ones. She graduated from Bong Community High School. Her studies were interrupted by the war, during which she taught in the Morris Farm Refugee Camp. She went to KRTTI in 2002 for a C Certificate, after which she resumed her duties at MARCO. She joined LEAP in 2004. “LEAP did a wonderful thing for me” she says. She felt unready for the classroom until she learned a methodology that was appropriate for young children. It encouraged her to stay in the classroom, she says. Her goal is to go to a teachers college for a four-year education degree and continue as a teacher. She has three children, one of whom is working on a master’s degree at the University of Liberia.

Margibi County

Janet Zenneh

Janet Zenneh teaches grades 3 to 5 at Firestone Division 44 School in reading, writing and math. Her third grades average 45 students; fourth grades have 90 students and fifth is 68 students. She went to J.W. Pearson High School in Ganta in 1982 and received her C Certificate from ZRTTI in 2000. She is married with four children and is raising two others. She started with LEAP in 2004 and was trained as a co-trainer. “I never wanted to be a teacher,” she says. She had planned to be a nurse. “I was fortunate to have LEAP training so now I really enjoy teaching and I am making it my career,” she says. She wants to go for more education.

Mary Molubah

Mary W. Molubah has co-trained with the FOL teacher trainers since 2002 and teaches Kindergarten One at Dolo’s Town Public Elementary and Junior High School in Margibi County. She has 14 years of teaching experience and is studying at the University of Liberia for her bachelor’s degree in primary education. Her vision is to bring early childhood education teacher training to the University. She paid her way through Tubman High School by raising and selling greens and graduated in 1989.  The war interrupted her education, but in 1998, she was persuaded to go into the classroom as a teacher, even though she hoped to become a nurse. In 1999, the government sent her to KRTTI, where she received a C Certificate. By this time, she had five children and was raising them alone. In 2001, she went to her first LEAP workshop and she says that it inspired her to remain a teacher. In 2002, she became a co-trainer with LEAP. “LEAP gave me more desire to teach,” she says. “Teaching with LEAP methodologies encourages the children. It helps you to be creative—children learn faster.” She is currently running for national office with the National Teachers Association.

William Ketter

William Ketter, the secretary of LEAP, is principal at Brownell Public School at Brownell Farm in Margibi County. He obtained his diploma in 1978 from the KRTTI Extension High School and was hired by the Ministry of Education to teach in 1979. His career was interrupted by the war, but in 1999, he was reactivated and assigned to the Brownell Public School as vice principal. In 2010, he became principal. In 2001, he joined LEAP and became a co-trainer in 2004. He is married and has four children. “LEAP is great,” he says. “The training has had a very positive impact in our community. You can tell the children who are affected by LEAP; they are inquisitive and interactive with other people. They want to go beyond just what they know.”

Grand Bassa County

Ernestine Singbay

Ernestine Sayngbe teaches K-1 at Buchanan Modern Elementary, a private school that teaches kindergarten through 6th grade. She has 70 children, ranging in age from 6 to 10 in her classroom. Educated through high school in Sierra Leone, she received her C Certificate from Lincoses in Monrovia. She has been teaching since 2003 and joined LEAP training in 2004. Ernestine says LEAP training showed her how to get down to the level of children in teaching. She noticed the difference in children’s willingness to come to school. Even after they are promoted to the next grade, they often come back to her classroom. She receives praise for her teaching even in the marketplace. She says her principal acknowledges her skill by letting her do the teacher training at the school.

J “Theo” Frankyu

J. Theophilus “Theo” Frankyu, vice president of the LEAP teacher network, has been a LEAP co-trainer with FOL since 2001. He is the principal for both morning and afternoon sessions of the Kpanay Town Public Elementary and Junior High School in Buchanan, Grand Bassa County, which has 830 children. He has been a teacher for 21 years and a principal for 20 years. He graduated from Bassa High School in 1983 and KRTTI in 1999. He is a 2013 graduate of the Grand Bassa Community College with an associate degree in educational administration. In 2004, he participated in organizational training from FOL and helped to revise the Early Childhood Education manual. He is married and has 8 children. “LEAP methods have changed my former way of teaching young children to developmentally appropriate methods,” he says. “LEAP methods help me to teach the whole child—physically, mentally, socially and psychologically.”

John Fahwor

John Fahwor Sr., the board member for Grand Bassa, is an 18-year educator and principal at the Drims School System in Buchanan. He is a 1987 graduate of W.P.L. Brumskine High School and went to Grand Bassa Community College, where he graduated with an associate degree in education. He first came to LEAP in 2001 and became a co-trainer in 2004. “LEAP has changed my style of teaching to the method we learned from FOL. I have become a trainer in my school as a principal and I join my other colleagues in Bassa County, where we train other teachers in the methodology. It has really improved teachers’ lives in the classroom, he says.” He is married and has four children.

Francis Harris

Francis Harris is a teacher of grades 5 to 9 at Kpany Town Elementary and Junior High School in Kpany Town Grand Bassa County and has been a principal for elementary school and junior high at Fortsville and senior high in Gorble. He graduated from Lincoln Ross High School in Monrovia and then went on to ZRTTI to receive a C Certificate in 1977. In 1989, he went to KRTTI to earn an associate degree in education.  He joined LEAP in 2001. He is married and has seven children. He says LEAP was something new in his teaching life. He was used to teaching abstract things. He finds that student learning is faster and easier with LEAP methodology because the children are able to see and feel things with the hands-on philosophy.

Bong County

Yatta Nrotoe

Yatta M. Nrotoe, the board member for Margibi, trains teachers in a C Certificate program at Kakata Rural Teacher Training Institute at Kakata, Margibi County. She has been in LEAP trainings since 1999 and became a co-trainer in 2000. At that time, she was working with Phebe Community Lutheran High School (nursery through 12) as a kindergarten teacher.  She is a native of Suacoco but she works in Kakata. In the KRTTI 2012/2013 school year she had 37 teacher candidates in her class. She went to Cuttington University College in primary education and graduated cum laude in July 2012. The government supports educating female teachers who want to continue their studies in education. “LEAP has affected my teaching,” she says. “It has made a great change in my teaching life and encouraged me to continue to be a teacher.” She says her KRTTI students love LEAP methodology.

Nowai Kapu

Nowai S. Kapu is principal at J.F. Clark Nursery through 6th grade in Gbarnga, Bong County.  She went to Gboveh High School after which she went to KRTTI to earn a B Certificate in 1988. She taught at S. Gboveh in Bong. During the war, she was trained by the International Rescue Committee as a refugee teacher and taught for them for seven years. In 1998, she returned to Bong County and started at J.F. Clark, which has two sessions. Each nursery class will have more than 100 students. She joined LEAP in 2000. “When you don’t have materials to teach you are not equipped” she says. The mandatory education decree had eroded her sense of competence in the job. LEAP helped with ideas and made her love students and parents, she says. She is married to the Bong County Education Officer and they have 6 children. What she has been taught she teaches to her teachers and that has raised enrollment, she says. Her school is very popular.

Nimba County

Chester Bainmie

Chester V. Bainmie, the chairman of the board of LEAP, is the principal at J.W. Pearson High School, the only public high school in Ganta City, where he also teaches three sections of math in 11th grade, each with 120 students. He graduated from Central High School in Sanniquelle in 1978 and went to KRTTI, receiving his B Certificate in 1981. He began teaching at the elementary level in 1981.He joined LEAP in 2001 and went back to college at the University of Liberia, graduating in 2010 with a bachelor’s in Secondary Education. He is married with two children, 10 grandchildren and two great grandchildren. “LEAP is really helpful added to what I learned in school,” he says.

Josephine Diagor

Josephine Diagor, chaplain and county liaison for LEAP, is principal at J.W. Pearson Nursery School in Ganta City, which has ABC, K-1 and K-2. She says it is a “LEAP school” as it just covers the early childhood years. She graduated from ZRTTI in 1979, after which she began teaching and was later made principal of the nursery school in Ganta. She joined LEAP in 2000 and after that training she felt she should follow her education. In 2001, she started her own private nursery and daycare, which she later leased to make school money. In 2009, she entered Liberia International Christian College in Ganta and graduated with an associate degree in Christian education.  She then resumed her duties as principal. She is married and has six children. “LEAP teaching is very important because you are not just dealing with the classroom, but we go in the playground and play” she says. In LEAP, she even learned to teach young children science. LEAP encouraged her to continue her education. She likes the fact that LEAP is not just in private school, but in the public schools, where most of the children are. She has 486 students in her school in six classrooms. ABC has 150 students; K1 has 75; K2 has 85, many of them older than 10.

Stanley Bembo

Stanley Z. Bembo is principal at George A. Dunbar School, nursery to 9th grade, in Nengbehn Nimba County, which has 560 students. He graduated from Sanniquelle St. Mary’s High School in 1976 and went to ZRTTI to obtain a C Certificate in 1977. In 1987 to 1989, he attended University of Liberia, where his education was interrupted by the war. He has been a teacher since 1978 and joined LEAP in 2000. In 1993, he became principal at George A. Dunbar and continued to teach general science. In 2001, he became a co-trainer for LEAP and in 2004, he became a chief trainer. He was trained that year in organizational development and leadership. In 2005, he was trained in teaching and school administration by Creative Associates in their Accelerated Learning Program. In 2010, he became a master trainer for Alternative Basic Education Advancing Youth Project facilitators in charge of the Ganta Cluster. He is married and has six children.  LEAP training enabled him to get into the Advanced Youth training. At his school, he conducts teacher training workshops for Bain-Garr Education District. He also holds periodic training for teachers in his school in LEAP ECE methodology. He enjoys both learning and teaching.

Nyanquoi Toe

P. Nyanquoi Toe teaches 3rd through 6th grade at Tongeltown Public School in Ganta. He has been teaching for 22 years and has been with LEAP since 2001. In 2002, he became a co-trainer. He graduated from KRTTI in 1989. He taught at private schools throughout the war and was recruited by the government to public schools in 2009. He is married and has six children. “LEAP methodology is really helpful to me,” he says. “When I graduated, I did not really know how to do it. I like promoting other teachers who work along with us in the school.”