Charity Akoshiwo Tornyewonya Zormelo is held in high esteem as the first female graduate from the Gold Coast of Ghana.
She was also the first woman from English-speaking West Africa to earn a B.S Degree.
Born in Keta, Ghana, Charity Zormelo was the daughter of former North German Mission employee and fishing business proprietor, Godfred Nyavor Zormelo, and her wife, Patience Abolitsi Dzokotoe.
Her half-sister, was Victoria Zormelo-Gorleku.
She was a graduate of the local African Methodist Episcopal Zion School in 1919, before becoming a teacher.
Charity was later sponsored by the local minister to travel to the United States in 1926 for further study.
In 1930, she graduated from high school in Bordentown, New Jersey, and used a $300 scholarship to enroll in Home Economics at Hampton Institute.
She was later recommended to teach at the Achimota College, unfortunately there were no teaching vacancies at that time. Charity Zormelo then returned to the Gold Coast where she began teaching at Mmofraturo, a recently founded Wesleyan girls boarding-school at Kumasi.
Charity’s efforts to pursue study in the United States for a Masters in Education were disrupted by World War II disrupted.
She moved to teach at New African University College in Anloga, where she married the college’s founder and President, Ferdinand Kwasi Fiawoo.
She died on the 14th of October 1945.
