On the 7th of September 1982, I entered a classroom in a secondary school in the small town of Kamabai to start what has now become a long teaching career. I left two years later.
There were a few interruptions. Between 1984 and 1988, I pursued a degree course at FBC, and I had a two-year stint in journalism at the Sierra Leone Daily Mail. Both, however, were interlaced with periods in the classroom: in the provinces and in Freetown. The eleven-year Civil War had its heavy toll, but I stayed on in the classroom, unencumbered by the hard realities of that time. When, for a moment, you ignore the unattractive conditions of service at the time, you’ll see the excitement in the profession itself. I had the opportunity to interact with young boys and girls from different cultural frames of reference: from the rural settings of Kamabai to the district headquarter town of Kabala and to Freetown. Every encounter was an opportunity to try a new idea or a new approach. I kept massive records of their class performances and the various methods I used to approach the topics.

In July 2002, however, (after 20 years of service), I thought I had had enough: I submitted my resignation letter to my principal in Freetown. I don’t have much time to explain the reasons here, but it marked the end of my service within the school system.

Unfortunately, it didn’t end my teaching career as I had hoped. Two months later, when the new school year started in September, I found my home flooded with students seeking remedial classes. Reluctantly, I started engaging some of them at the weekend. It turned out to be a mistake because more kept coming.

By November 2002, the crowd at home had become unbearable, and I was forced to rent out a floor space at 1 Short Street, Freetown. By the end of the academic year, I thought the student population had reached critical mass, enough to sustain the momentum for the following years to come. That prompted me to register it as an educational business enterprise, naming it: APEX EDUCATIONAL CENTRE.

My initial attempt to abandon the teaching profession and engage in something else failed, and I had to engage instead in modernizing the enterprise I had just created. With the huge data and class notes I had accumulated over the years and the acquisition of a computer I bought online, I had the perfect opportunity to approach the “teaching platform” from a different angle and in my own way. I converted my notes into pamphlets, computerized all my accumulated data for better analysis, and started coding and writing computer programs for my students.

Since then the students have been a great inspiration to me, and I have stayed on. I can even say I have learnt much more from them than I have taught. I still do the same thing I did several years ago: spend several hours in the classroom receiving one group of students after another.40 YEARS IN THE PROFESSION
On the 7th of September 1982, I entered a classroom in a secondary school in the small town of Kamabai to start what has now become a long teaching career. I left two years later.
There were a few interruptions. Between 1984 and 1988, I pursued a degree course at FBC, and I had a two-year stint in journalism at the Sierra Leone Daily Mail. Both, however, were interlaced with periods in the classroom: in the provinces and in Freetown. The eleven-year Civil War had its heavy toll, but I stayed on in the classroom, unencumbered by the hard realities of that time. When, for a moment, you ignore the unattractive conditions of service at the time, you’ll see the excitement in the profession itself. I had the opportunity to interact with young boys and girls from different cultural frames of reference: from the rural settings of Kamabai to the district headquarter town of Kabala and to Freetown. Every encounter was an opportunity to try a new idea or a new approach. I kept massive records of their class performances and the various methods I used to approach the topics.

In July 2002, however, (after 20 years of service), I thought I had had enough: I submitted my resignation letter to my principal in Freetown. I don’t have much time to explain the reasons here, but it marked the end of my service within the school system.

Unfortunately, it didn’t end my teaching career as I had hoped. Two months later, when the new school year started in September, I found my home flooded with students seeking remedial classes. Reluctantly, I started engaging some of them at the weekend. It turned out to be a mistake because more kept coming.

By November 2002, the crowd at home had become unbearable, and I was forced to rent out a floor space at 1 Short Street, Freetown. By the end of the academic year, I thought the student population had reached critical mass, enough to sustain the momentum for the following years to come. That prompted me to register it as an educational business enterprise, naming it: APEX EDUCATIONAL CENTRE.

My initial attempt to abandon the teaching profession and engage in something else failed, and I had to engage instead in modernizing the enterprise I had just created. With the huge data and class notes I had accumulated over the years and the acquisition of a computer I bought online, I had the perfect opportunity to approach the “teaching platform” from a different angle and in my own way. I converted my notes into pamphlets, computerized all my accumulated data for better analysis, and started coding and writing computer programs for my students.

Since then the students have been a great inspiration to me, and I have stayed on. I can even say I have learnt much more from them than I have taught. I still do the same thing I did several years ago: spend several hours in the classroom receiving one group of students after another.