How Maritime Academy grew into an award-winning school

Maritime Academy, Alimosho, honored this year as the CCPMH Best Educator Award winner, has traced its remarkable journey from a modest childhood dream to a thriving multi-branch institution committed to accessible quality education.

The founder, Mr. Noah Ayodele Bello, first discovered his passion for teaching as a secondary school student, when he realised he had a unique ability to quickly grasp difficult subjects and explain them clearly to his classmates. Repeated positive feedback strengthened his conviction that education was his natural calling.

But his decision to pursue teaching initially met strong resistance at home. His parents, especially his mother—herself a former teacher forced out of the profession due to poor remuneration—feared he was choosing a financially insecure path. 

To secure their support, Noah proposed building not just a career but an institution. He told them he would establish his own school and name it “Marytime” in honour of his mother’s former salon and her unfulfilled teaching journey. The gesture won his parents over.

In 2010, his mother, Rev. Mother Mary Bello, provided initial funding by offering the family property at 56 Idowu Anishere Street, Ikotun, where Noah began with a tutorial center. The first attempt struggled, but the dream officially materialized in 2011 with the founding of Maritime Academy, designed to address a widening gap in Nigeria’s education system: overcrowded public schools and unaffordable private schools.

The academy’s early years were slow and underfunded. To strengthen the institution, Noah’s elder brother, Engineer Damilola Israel Bello—who later earned a postgraduate qualification in education—joined the school, contributing managerial expertise and science teaching skills. Together, they built the school on a mission to offer quality, affordable and sustainable education to children from low-income families.

The academy expanded in 2013 with the opening of its second branch in Ajegunle, where demand for accessible schooling was even more significant. Its growth, driven by a commitment to serve underserved communities, has positioned Maritime Academy as a model for grassroots educational development.