We created this innovation in response to the urgent education crisis in rural Northern Ghana, where children make up a large share of the population, yet many remain out of school - OoS. The 2021 Population and Housing Census shows that 1,215,546 children aged 4–17 in Ghana are not attending school, with the Northern Region recording the highest rates, e.g. Savanah, Northeast and Northern regions have 56%, 49% and 47% respectfully as compared to Greater Accra with only 9%. Girls are especially affected, with 270,036 girls in the region out of school. This challenge is worsened by deep poverty-80.8% of people in the Northern Region live in multidimensional poverty, limiting families’ ability to support schooling.
Our goal aligns with SDG 4, to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all. Through five years of CBE and 4 years of STAGE - OoS interventions, we found that most OoSC supported were from rural Northern Ghana and even within these communities, children face different and complex barriers. After 20+ years of working in education, we also saw that many interventions were too generic to address these realities.
This led us to design a simple, scalable, and cost-effective model built around the community’s greatest resource - its people. By creating a multidisciplinary team of trusted community and state stakeholders, we established multiple touchpoints to respond to each child’s specific needs and shift community mindsets on the value of education.
Our innovation is a community-driven, multidisciplinary support system that identifies, supports, and monitors children at risk of dropping out or already out of school. In practice, it operates through a local team made up of trusted community actors - religious leaders, the chief’s representative, district assembly officials, GES, Social Welfare, Ghana Health Service and trained community volunteers.
The process begins with community-led identification of children who are not in school or struggling to stay engaged. The team then conducts household visits to understand the specific barriers each child faces, whether related to poverty, health, protection, disability, or negative social norms. Based on this assessment, actions are assigned to the stakeholder best positioned to intervene: Social Welfare handles protection issues, Health Service supports health-related absenteeism, GES resolves school-level challenges using counselors. Community and religious leaders lead mindset and behavior change.
The team meets regularly to track each child’s progress, coordinate support and engage caregivers. This creates multiple, consistent touchpoints around every vulnerable child. Community dialogue, home visits, and simple local monitoring tools ensure continuous follow-up.
In daily practice, the innovation looks like a coordinated community network actively preventing dropout, supporting households, shifting norms, and ensuring each child has a clear pathway back to learning.
Our innovation has been spreading quickly because it is simple, community-led and delivers visible results. We began with 1,400 children across 60 school communities in 3 districts of 2 regions in Northern Ghana. As the model proved effective, it expanded naturally to currently support 6,400 children using the same community-driven system.
Although we currently operate in only 3 of 55 districts in Northern Ghana, demand has grown rapidly. All five Regional Ghana Education Service Directorates have formally requested that we scale the model to additional districts, reflecting strong institutional confidence.
The model spreads easily because it is low-cost and built on existing community structures. Community teams require minimal training, and the tools are simple enough for any community to adopt without external resources.
We also see organic replication in neighboring communities that are not part of the project. They observe improvements - children becoming more confident, reading in church (a thing of pride), behaving better and engaging more in school. Parents in these communities on their own are now walking children to school, meeting teachers, supporting learning at home and revitalizing PTAs and SMCs.
Because the model relies on people rather than expensive systems, communities are copying it on their own. This natural diffusion shows that the approach is sustainable, scalable and suitable for any community committed to improving children’s education.
We have strengthened our innovation by integrating a tailored livelihood and microfinance component for mothers of the children we support. During implementation, we recognized that even with strong community structures, many children remained at risk of dropping out because caregivers could not afford essentials such as uniforms, sandals, books, and bags.
Poverty was a major barrier. To address this, we adapted our microfinance intervention to directly include mothers of enrolled children, especially those from extremely poor households. Through small loans, savings support, and basic financial coaching, these mothers can now generate income and consistently provide for their children’s schooling needs.
This modification strengthens the core innovation by ensuring parents not only value education but also have the capacity to act on that commitment. Early results show improved attendance, fewer dropouts, and stronger parental engagement.
We are now evolving this into a stronger model - Rise Up, which seeks to unlock the full potential of communities and parents who we refer to as the “sleeping giants,” to sustain change. We are working with consultants to refine the model through research, community engagement manuals, and a pilot that will firm it up for wider rollout. We aim to roll out the pilot next year - 2026
This is a simple model which is one of the objectives of the solution so that every community can try it. Therefore, by understanding the core principles of the model and how it operates in practice, every community can replicate it. Begin by identifying children who are at risk of dropping out or already out of school and engaging key community stakeholders such as chiefs, religious leaders, teachers and caregivers to form a local support team. Work with this team to assess each child’s specific barriers, whether related to poverty, health, protection or social norms, and assign actions to the stakeholder best placed to address them.
Where necessary, link households to practical support, including school materials or livelihood interventions that empower parents, especially mothers, to support their children’s education. Set up simple tools (you can develo your own simple template) to monitor attendance, learning, and wellbeing, and hold regular community meetings to track progress and maintain accountability.
Start small, perhaps with a few children or schools, learn from the process, and build gradually. The key is that the model is community-driven, low-cost, and scalable by relying on people rather than expensive systems, it can grow organically as neighboring communities see results and adopt the practices themselves. This step-by-step, people-centered approach ensures children stay in school and communities take ownership of their education outcomes.
