I met Priscilla in late March 2012 at Women Mentoring Network, a non-profit to empower women with life skills. Priscilla was a presenter and talked about starting CPASGhana, a non-profit to send girls to schools in Ghana. She was a retired art teacher, soft-spoken and had no personal tie with the country. Priscilla fell in love with the locals after a visit to Nsawam, Ghana in 2011. Meanwhile, she saw that girls were often taken out of school before boys to work or care for the family, thus trapped in the cycle of poverty. Priscilla decided to change that by giving girls education and skills for more opportunities. She sought donations from friends and families and sent 41 girls to school in the first year.
I was blown away by Priscilla’s story. I introduced myself after her presentation and asked if something I could support. We had a coffee chat the following week. Later, I met people from CPASGhana advisory board to discuss the strategic plan.
In 2013, while I was working on a digital marketing certificate, a class assignment was to do a SEM (search engine marketing) project. I asked Priscilla if she’d let me experiment/ enhance CPASGhana website. She immediately said Yes. The website had a decent design but no analytics, SEO (search engine optimization) or marketing. I worked with the web designer, learned about WordPress, and set-up Google Analytics, keywords, Adwords, etc. The traffic to the website went from little-to-none to 20 in a week with about $5 spending. It was exciting “small wins” and a great learning experience for me.
In the past 10 years, CPASGhana has supported over 500 students as well as run microfinance, village savings, and loan programs. Under Covid-19, CPASGhana also donated reusable masks to 3 public schools. Welcome to donate or spread the words for CPASGhana.
Thanks to Priscilla and CPASGhana team to fuel a brighter future for more girls!