Education Access
Ten Chromebooks and one Starlink in Monrovia
Francis Ivan Johnson founded Science Plus Liberia, an after-school STEAM lab that has taken more than 100 middle and high school students through two cohorts in Monrovia and, at weekends, in rural Kakata.
The lab has ten Chromebooks and one Starlink terminal, gifted by Global STEM Partnership Inc of the US. At weekends that same equipment is what runs the rural mobile STEAM lab in Kakata, in Margibi County.
Science Plus Liberia Inc is a registered non-profit STEAM institution, "run by low income classroom teachers". Francis Ivan Johnson, a secondary school biology teacher, is the founder and executive director. Julius J Doe co-founded it and is the programme manager.
“True happiness can only be found in making others find the path in this life.”
Francis Ivan Johnson
It is, in the founder's description, "the only Liberian based STEAM Lab program" running an after-school programme for middle and high school students in Monrovia, the capital, and in Kakata.
Students there work through an AI bootcamp called Kerkula, CAD, TinkerCAD, Onshape, 3D printing and Arduino robotics. The skills are meant to build "curiosity and critical thinking skills in solving local and national problems", across environment, food security, engineering design, medicine, agriculture and technology.
The reason the programme exists is an observation made from inside a classroom. Over the past years, teachers saw a huge gap in STEAM education in Liberia, and saw students not taking up the careers that national growth and development most need. So they started something after school.
Over the past year more than 100 students have come through two cohorts. What has changed, Francis reports, is "presentation, collaboration, teamwork, leadership skills and storytelling".
Partnerships have followed, with Global STEM Partnership Inc, Vervient Foundation, Innovation International and STEMarts Lab, and students in Liberia now work with international students on STEAM projects.
Demand is running ahead of the kit. "We have limited resources in meeting up those demands," Francis says. Ten Chromebooks, one Starlink, two cities.