AT the start of year three in its operation, ttschoolpal.com co-founder Makesi Paul said the organisation, born out of necessity in the wake of the covid19 pandemic, has remained relevant and has broadened its realm of impact in providing services of sourcing and delivering school supplies to subscribers while helping less fortunate students access books, stationary and other back-to-school must-haves.
"My business partner, Nicholas Marshall, and I conceptualised the service in 2019."
He said the organisation has seen over 4,000 subscribers for various services and has assisted over 300 students with school supplies, many of whom the organisation has assisted since inception. This evolved from a charitable initiative aligned with the NGO Halimah's Helping Hands (HHH).
[caption id="attachment_964607" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Getting a booklist covered can be a three-day event for most parents, this can now be made less tedious and even non-existent for some parents through services available on ttschoolpal.com.-[/caption]
"Other charitable organisations have come on board to assist students, including the Rotary Foundation and Rotary Club of Port of Spain through their charity drives. Last year we collaborated to assist about 90 students at the beginning of the school year."
While serving as president of the Rotaract Club of Port of Spain Paul did collaborative work with Halimah's Helping Hands (HHH). He was inspired by its work, and has been collaborating with the NGO since the launch of ttschoolpal.com in 2020.
HHH was founded in 2014 by Hisham and Haajra Mohammed following the death of their daughter, Halimah, who died at 11 due to misdiagnosed pneumonia.
"They would get books, bags, uniforms, socks, shoes, pencil cases and other supplies for students whose parents could not afford everything necessary for school. They had connections with bookstores and would have already experienced distributing them to students. They already had the experience providing the service for less fortunate children."
Paul said ttschoolpal.com decided to merge the service of sourcing and delivering school supplies to students at a cost, with the approach of HHH's approach to assisting those in need.
"A percentage of costs paid by children whose parents can afford our services go toward assisting children whose parents cannot afford the services. If we have one per cent of the total population of students utilising our services, we could afford to assist many children meet their needs."
He said the addition of information communication technology (ICT) via its website, with references and past examination papers, saw the product getting closer to the initial vision.
"We collaborated with Gabcol for our website which was a match made in business heaven. Feature of the website, of which we are proud, are those which help level the playing field. One of these is a feature which assists in locating where books are available and compares prices of each book from various bookshops."
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