By: Ilyasa Baa
Salvation Academy has a mandate to train four hundred youths by September 2022, so far 275 have been capacitated through its Information Technology in Health Care; a program introduced to take the minds of Sierra Leonean youths away from “Temple Run” so they can stay in their country.
According to the President of the Salvation Academy, Brima Deen, the goal of their training is to get youths off the street and transform them for the good of the country. He informed this medium that the Academy has been changing lives since 2012 when it was established in the country.
He said as a service provider recommended by UNESCO, transforming the lives of young people is their course noting that a good number of Sierra Leonean youths have perished in the seas because they wanted to leave their country. He said the country is beautiful to stay that is why they embarked on instilling confidence in the minds of the youths.
Deen maintained that the ICT and medical course offered at the Academy will help the country achieve a health population. He said he goes to the ghettoes and wash car grounds to recruit youths so they can learn something and be productive to the nation. He noted that since they established in Sierra Leone, a good number of learners have been awarded scholarship as a way of inspiring them to be productive citizens.
In another development, Salvation Academy has introduced traditional medicine as part of its curriculum through the help of a Consultant and Lecturer at College of Medicine and Allied Sciences, N/Dr. Kwame who is using his outlet to offer more training to students of the Academy. The Academy has set up a diagnostic lab, surgery room and has got some of the equipment to make traditional medicines which can cure diabetes, ulcer, hypertension and other sicknesses.
“We are working on our products especially with regards packaging so we can start exporting them to match with international standards”, the President elaborated, adding that at their campus at Dundas Street, Freetown, experts will start seeing patients so the trainees will learn the practical aspect alongside the theory. He said
Salvation Academy was established in Alexandria in the USA. It was designed to help the destitute, people who may want to go to college but they don’t have the finance to be able to accomplish. In the State of Virginia, USA, the State pays people when they lose their referred to as unemployment compensation. Instead of paying them, they take them to service providers and Salvation Academy happens to be one of them that train jobless people and find jobs for them, subsequently. In Sierra Leone branch of the Academy was established in 2012 and has been training 400 youths annually to match with UNESCO standard and the United Nations Slogan: Education to Career promoting reading and learning amongst young people in Sierra Leone
