CELEBRATION! Heritage UMC High School Opens In Kabala

Heritage High School of Littleton, Colorado funds a partner school in Sierra Leone, West Africa

Heritage High School [Littleton, CO] principal Ken Moritz, Heritage staff member Tony Winger who started the idea of a Make A Difference week with his International Club in 2005 at Heritage, and Heritage teacher Shelley Harwell joined Operation Classroom member Les Law on a trip to celebrate the opening of Heritage UMC High School in Kabala, Sierra Leone West Africa. The Hope and Les Law Operation Classroom teacher training project begun in July of 2005 came full cycle as one of the teachers Daisy Digba Sankoh [L] who attended the teacher training workshops was named the principal of the Heritage UMC High School which is located outside of the northern city of Kabala in Sierra Leone. Heritage staff members who traveled to Sierra Leone in the fall of 2009 are pictured below L-R: Harwell, Moritz, and Winger. Behind the Colorado educators are four teachers from the new school. Principal Sankoh also teaches at the school.

The Heritage school construction project in the Kabala area began in July of 2008 and was completed at the end of the summer of 2009. The school uniforms [all schools in Sierra Leone wear uniforms] are the school colors of their partner school in Colorado. Les Law [below right].

Above: Students in uniform are pictured ready to start the parade from the center of Kabala through the town and out to the school. It was about a 5 mile walk. All the students, staff and the parents, and the Heritage Staff from Colorado participated in the march. Marchers sang and danced the whole way [Above]. After arriving at the new school a celebration and opening ceremony [below] was held.



The Heritage staff members brought over 180 penpal letters from Colorado. Handing out the penpal letters is Abu Bakaar. Bakaar is from Makeni and was helped in his schooling at the Poly Technical School in Makeni by the Laws. Bakaar is now a teacher at HHS in Kabala. He is excited to be at the Kabala school. His students have been very appreciative of his efforts.

Left: Shelley Harwell at the Kabala Amputee Camp. Above: The new classroom building for the Blind School located in Kabala. Operation Classroom will undertake a project in the summer of 2010 to build living quarters for the 45 blind students at the school.


Heritage Staff members participate in a live blog exchange from Kabala back to Heritage High School staff, supporters of the project and students. The laptop was left with the principal at the Kabala Heritage Secondary School.

Hope Law took the picture above of a chameleon in July of 2008. The chameleon was in the jungle area [photo below] that covered the original worksite and was eyeballing OC work in Kabala.

Heritage High School students [L-R] Lindsay Strine, Claire McKeever, and Kira Gruzinski pause in their work as Rev. Eddie Kamara dedicates the cornerstone of the Heritage UMC High School. July 2008.