ELMINA, Ghana — The Lemon Foundation has donated 100 school desks to Edinaman SHS and refurbished three classrooms on the campus, easing a furniture shortage that has strained one of Elmina’s oldest second-cycle schools.
The refurbishment upgraded the classroom windows and gave the three rooms a fresh coat of paint, part of a wider effort by the foundation to improve learning conditions in the Komenda-Edina-Eguafo-Abirem (KEEA) Municipality. The foundation handed over the items at the school on Paul Isert Hill on Friday 24th July 2026.
The foundation was led by its chief executive, Isaac Yirenkyi. Accompanying the management were the owners of the Lemon Group of Companies, Kelvin Kofi Amissah and David Duron, who serves as a development chief in Edinaman under the stool name Nana Ankama I. Members of the Edina Traditional Council also attended.
The donation lands amid a national shortage of school furniture. The Education Ministry says it is procuring 200,000 mono desks for 100 double-track senior high schools identified as priority cases as they move to the single-track system, part of a broader effort to close furniture gaps across the country. Edinaman, which runs a double-track calendar, sits within that pressured group. Across Ghana, education data has put the desk shortage at about 40%, with students in some schools sitting on floors, benches or broken furniture during lessons.
Edinaman Senior High School has a long history in the town. Established on 9 January 1978 as Edinaman Day School, it first operated from Elmina Castle before moving to its current site on Paul Isert Hill in 1992. It began admitting boarders in 2008 and today runs a mixed, science and technology-focused programme with an emphasis on ICT.
Receiving the items, the school’s management said they were elated by the donation and promised to take good care of the furniture. Leaders of the traditional council tasked the school authorities to keep the furniture in good condition and to hold any student accountable for misuse.
The Lemon Foundation grew out of the Lemon Group, whose story began in 2011 when two families from different continents met by chance in Elmina, bought land together and set out to build a business that would give back to the community. The foundation now runs as an NGO that connects guests of the group’s facilities with talented local children in need, and it reports 70 sponsored children and 35 “step-parents” supporting them.
The foundation works on a simple principle: any guest who stays at or uses a Lemon facility can choose to leave a positive footprint in Elmina. Guests can sponsor a school uniform for a child for US$12, refurbish two classrooms by repainting them and improving the school environment in the KEEA Municipality for US$600, or sponsor a talented but underprivileged student through a remote adoption programme. For US$250 a year, the programme covers everything a child needs to stay in school, including tuition, textbooks, uniforms, clothing and a daily snack. For larger groups, the foundation organises community transformation projects such as the Edinaman donation.
The desks handed over at Edinaman were sponsored by Raynet CRM and by students from Honors Academia, who together donated 50 desks, and by Lemon Beach Resort, which donated the other 50. Every guest who stays, dines or simply visits Lemon Beach Resort becomes part of these initiatives.