SfL started in 1995, springing from cooperation on rural development between the Northern Ghana-based civil society organization, Ghana Developing Communities Association (GDCA) and a Danish NGO (the Ghana Friendship Groups in Denmark). The partners saw education as a pillar for development and at the same time realized that there were serious challenges to education performance in deprived parts of Northern Ghana.
One major challenge identified by Development Practitioners in Northern Ghana and in Denmark was the high numbers of out-of-school children, described as “the dilemma of education in Northern Ghana.” As a way of addressing the out-of-school children phenomenon, SfL developed a functional literacy programme in 1995, which has evolved to become what is now known as Complementary Basic Education (CBE).
