Sierra Ainsley

Last year, I was the Lead teacher at the Canadian Vietnamese School in Ho Chi Minh City. While living and working in Toronto I made numerous trips to Jamaica a year. As a reading recovery trained teacher and literacy coordinated I participated in literacy projects , tested high school students ( in reading and writing), hired and trained teachers to support a literacy program. In 2015, with my other directors of SMILE (single mothers inspiring leadership in education) we built a playground in Prickly Pole (a remote mountain area in Jamaica) when it was brought to our attention that children often travelled an over an hour by foot each way to attend school. Our hope was with a safe place to play children would attend and stay in school longer. In 2013 we had built separate toilets for girls and boys, a small but