The annual Bemore Summer Boot Camp programme organized by the Bemore Empowered Girls Foundation started in 2017. As the years went by, the organizers thought it wise to include the physically challenged. So, in the fifth edition in 2022 , the physically-challenged were admitted.
Six hearing-impaired girls participated in the two-week-long intensive training programme in that year. In the sixth edition in 2023, four hearing impaired females took part.
In the ongoing 7th edition holding at the Lead City International School Jericho Ibadan Oyo State, six hearing impaired girls drawn from Oyo and Ondo States are taking part.
Four of the teen girls are students of Christian Mission School for the Deaf Ibadan while the other two are from the Ondo State School for the Deaf, Akure, Ondo State.
Of the four special participants from Oyo State, the condition of 17-year-old Miss Janet Layode, 17 stands out. She is a native of Ife Central Local Government Area of Osun State.
Both parents are also physically challenged. Her father, Sampson Layode uses a wheelchair so also her mother.
In spite of their challenges, Mr. Layode still nurses high dreams for his daughter. He told this reporter that he desires that Janet obtains a university education and becomes great in life. He doesn’t know how this will happen because ” I don’t have anyone to help me except God”. It was good to hear him say ‘except God’.
Of course, God has waded into Janet’s matter. He is already working through the initiator of Bemore Empowered Girls Foundation, Dr. Betty Anyanwu-Akeredolu, who is bankrolling her training at the ongoing Bemore Summer Boot Camp.
Janet alongside other participants will be trained in Information Communication Technology, ICT and solar energy. She will also be inculcated with such life-changing skills as bead-making, hairdressing, gele-tying, cake-making, dancing, arts and crafts. Janet will be taught music and the art of public speaking as well as taekwondo.
If she could have the opportunity to attend this year ‘s training programme, it means God could also see her up to the tertiary level of formal education.
Mr. Layode was effusive in his thanks to the initiator of the programme for sponsoring Janet ‘in the university of life ” as the Bemore Summer Boot Camp is referred to.
“I sincerely appreciate Dr. Betty Anyanwu-Akeredolu for sponsoring my daughter’s training. My desire is for Janet to become a better person. That is why I am doing my best. I want her to get university education “.
Janet speaking through an interpreter, Olabode Oluwatoyin also expressed her profound gratitude to Dr. Akeredolu for bankrolling her training.
She disclosed that she is blending well in camp even as she thanked their chaperone and facilitators for making the camp conducive for their training.
