Today is Literacy Day and I want to point out the achievements of a group of girls who graduated from high school in Ghana in spite of conditions that made learning and earning a high school diploma a challenge.

Graduating from high school is not an easy task for girls in developing countries as you may have read in an article I wrote earlier the other week.

Sadly, this still holds true in places where, though girls have equal enrollment in primary school, the gender gap still exists for secondary school. In Uganda, for every 10 boys that enroll in secondary school only 8 girls enroll and attend.

Girls commonly drop out of secondary school especially in developing countries due to lack of clean sanitation, tools for managing periods, support from parents, the ability to afford school supplies, school fees and a host of other reasons.

The benefits of girls education are so far reaching, from lower infant mortality rates to fostering communities where children have better access to education and nutrition. Since, you know, women invest 90 percent of their earned income on families.

But there are programs that help support girls when they start to face challenges in finishing school. At the Mansoman Senior High School in Bonsaaso, Ghana, teachers like Sarah Kwarteng not only recognize that this is gender inequality, but also that girls have incredible and brilliant potential when it comes to academic achievement.

Kwarteng was not the only one to recognize the potential of these female high school students either.

In this video, you can see the support that community members showed in providing education to girls in the Millennium village in Bonsaaso. Community members nominated these girls to receive scholarships from Connect to Learn. This scholarship supports smart and talented girls and enables them to graduate from high school in Ghana. It also provides access for teachers in rural communities to internet and mobile broadband so that they have current knowledge to share with students.

Girls everywhere deserve equal access to education and programs like these show that with a little financial investment and community support girls can achieve amazing things.

Check out 1:20 to find out how important access to technology, internet, and computers is to education at the secondary level. Technology moves so quickly today, it’s incredibly important to make sure it’s included in education all over the world.

Go to TAKE ACTION NOW and sign the petition to make sure all children, (especially girls) have equal access to education.