Outreach Uganda

NEWSLETTER

Outreach Uganda

Issue 1 2015

CHILD OF HOPE — UK & IRELANDUK Office contact details: Child of Hope 1 Old Kiln Rd Upton, POOLE BH16 5SG Tel: (01202) 697201enquiries@childofhopeuganda.orgwww.childofhopeuganda.org

Registered UK Charity: 1136068

YES, I WOULD LIKE TO MAKE A DONATION: (PLEASE RETURN THIS FORM TO THE UK ADDRESS BELOW)

My Details:

First Name:___________________________Last Name:__________________________________Title:__________

Address: _______________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________ Postcode:__________________________________________

Telephone:_________________________________________Email:________________________________________

I WOULD LIKE TO MAKE A ONE OFF GIFT

and I enclose a cheque made payable to Child of Hope for £___________________or make

a card payment on the childofhopeuganda.org website, or by ONLINE BANKING (see below).

or

I WOULD LIKE TO MAKE MONTHLY PAYMENTS TO CHILD OF HOPE BY STANDING ORDER: Please ensure you complete your address details above and bank details below.

£___________________ per month for (please tick): q Child sponsorship £15 q Teacher’s salary £60 q IGA grant £25

q Welfare worker’s salary (£25 full sponsorship, £10 part sponsorship q Food £5 q Healthcare £7 q General funds.

Starting on _____/_____/_____ until further notice from me in writing.

Bank name: __________________________________________________Sort code: _________________________

Bank address: ___________________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________ Postcode:____________________________________

Account name: ________________________________ Account no: ______________________________________

Signature: ______________________________________________Date:____________________________________

FOR ONLINE BANKING: childofhope Sortcode: 40-15-27 A/C No: 91406094 Ref: your name+postcode

Child of Hope is run in Uganda by husband and wife team Moses & Bex Okotel (pictured) and a staff of 36. In the UK and Ireland it is headed by a team of trustees and 28 volunteers, who make possible the life-changing social impact we provide for the children of the Namatala slum. If you would like to join the team, please see the UK Volunteers page on our website.

DONATIONS can made securely online at

childofhopeuganda.org or even better give via

ONLINE banking*

Find us on Facebook Badge CMYK / .eps

Volunteer report by Emma Stewart

*Online banking is the BEST way for Child of Hope to receive your donation as NO bank or paypal commission charges apply!

NEWSLETTER

GIFT AID DECLARATION For past, present & future donations to Child of Hope. If you are a UK taxpayer, the value of your gift can be increased by 25% under the Gift Aid scheme at no extra cost to you.

Please treat as Gift Aid donations, all qualifying gifts of money made to Child of Hope. Please tick all you wish to apply: q today q in the past 4 years q in the future

I confirm I have paid or will pay an amount of Income Tax and/or Capital Gains Tax for the current tax year (6 April to 5 April) that is at least equal to the amount of tax that all the charities and Community Amateur Sports Clubs (CASCs) that I donate to will reclaim on my gifts for the current tax year. I understand that other taxes such as VAT and Council Tax do not qualify. I understand the charity will reclaim 25p of tax on every £1 that I have given.

Please notify Child of Hope if you: • Want to cancel this declaration • Change your name or home address • No longer pay sufficient tax on your income and/or capital gains.

If you pay Income Tax at the higher or additional rate and want to receive the additional tax relief due to you, you must include all your Gift Aid donations on your Self Assessment tax return or ask HM Revenue and Customs to adjust your tax code.

Please complete your address details when signing this gift declaration form.

Signature: __________________________________________________________Date:_________________________________

My Job: My main job is to try and implement a new strategy for how reading and spelling are taught, particularly at the ‘foundational’ stage. In Uganda, teaching methods are somewhat behind those in the UK and the primary approach is still ‘rote learning’ where children learn to read and write through memorising hundreds of words. Unfortunately this is a pretty inefficient and ineffective learning style! Instead, I have been working on phonics as a basis for learning to read and spell. Children begin by learning ‘phonemes’ (the smallest sound components of English, represented by one or two letters such as ‘a’ as in ‘ant’ and ‘oo’ as in ‘moon’). From this basis they can then build more complex rules of spelling and grammar, hopefully leading to independent readers and writers … that’s the plan!

What are the challenges? The main issue is working against the system. The teachers have been trained to teach the ‘old’ method, so learning phonics goes against the grain. Further, the regular exam method of assessment in Uganda tests children’s memory banks and not their knowledge of applicable reading/spelling rules. There is little creativity or independent

thought encouraged. However, progress is being made. The children are quick to pick up new sounds and are beginning to read and write words more independently. The teachers are also keen to learn and the nursery department (headed by Scovia) are in the process of completely changing how English is taught. My aim is to have children able to read and write freely and fluently, so they can then focus on the meaning of the text. The growing library will be a great resource for this. The process will probably take some time (possibly years) but we are seeing positive changes on a week-by-week basis, and I am happy to be helping empower the teachers at Child of Hope.

Emma is a long term volunteer with Child of Hope.

I arrived at Child of Hope in the middle of January, two weeks before the new school year started. I have been working as a teacher, initially in

Nursery but now also in Primary classes.

Everything that Child of Hope does is focused on helping children, and that’s why we help our parents to start businesses — because we know that bringing up children well requires money.

There are so many needy and deserving children in Namatala but a place cannot be found for all of them at our school; we are only able to take one (occasionally two) children from each of the very poorest families. While boosting the income of our parents obviously benefits all of their children, it is always sad when the siblings cannot go to our school.

However, our IGA programme is helping to tackle this situation. As the income of our parents increases, they are then able to send one or two additional children to other local schools. While the standard of education and support may not be as high, at least these children are at school and benefiting from some education.

Latest figures show that 77 of our IGA parents are now able to send at least one other child to school. This means that – on top of all the 360 children at our school – a further 216 children are attending local schools through the help of Child of Hope!

If you would like to help, consider donating a £25 business startup grant. Please see the back page for further details.

More kids in school thanks to IGA Programme!

More Namatala kids are now getting an education — and it’s all down to our Income

Generating Activity (IGA) business start-up programme!

Martin Hayter (IGA business manager)encouraging one of the mums.

Who wants to be sent to ‘The Tower’?!

Our Admin team is particularly thrilled because, at last, the department is physically united with the rest of the COH staff on one site in the school’s ‘Tower’! Eagle eyed readers will have noticed that one side of the building is taller than the other. This extra ‘half floor’ has been built to accommodate the administration of Child of Hope and is deceptively large, including a meeting room, 2 individual offices

and one large open-office space. Additional floor space was created over the large stairwell and the whole area can easily accommodate all of our administrative needs. This is where ‘Aunty Bex’ can be found usually with her nose buried in her laptop. On the odd occasion she is asked by the welfare team or headteachers to assist in ‘behaviour management’ of particular children. Just like the Tower of London in times past, the Tower of Child of Hope is used as Bex’s ‘fortress’ (to hide when she wants to get her work done) and ‘prison’ for naughty children!

Our dream of having our own piece of land and school building is completed and we are delighted with the results.

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One the greatest struggles living in a slum is trying to stay healthy. In the ‘developed’ world it is so

easy to take for granted turning a tap on or flushing a toilet. The homes of our children in Namatala have neither, and the occurrence of diarrhoeal disease is depressingly common.

Here’s what the World Health Organisation says about it:

• Diarrhoeal disease is the second leading cause of death in children under five years old. It is both preventable and treatable.

• Each year diarrhoea kills around 760 000 children under five.

• A significant proportion of diarrhoeal disease can be prevented through safe drinking-water and adequate sanitation and hygiene.

• Globally, there are nearly 1.7 billion cases of diarrhoeal disease every year.

• Diarrhoea is a leading cause of malnutrition in children under five years old.

Agnes

Augustin

Betty

Francis

Dorcus

Here are just a few Child of Hope children who need your help! Would you consider becoming a sponsor and help make a difference?

Public transport in Uganda bears very little resemblance to its counterpart in the UK or any-

where else in the ‘developed’ world.

There are no local buses to get you from A to B within a town so most people use boda bodas — a local word to describe a rider and his motorbike. Passengers flag down a passing rider, tell him where they want to go and then jump on the back! Unfortunately, the boda boda industry is not easily regulated and there are many poorly maintained

bikes, poorly maintained roads and poorly skilled riders. There are daily accidents which, of course, can lead to anything from a few cuts and scrapes to death.

Seeing a bit of a gap in the market, we have decided at Child of Hope to start a safe boda boda business called Boda Buddies. We have bought 3 brand new motorbikes, thanks to a very generous grant from Gareth and Ursula Firth, and have trained up 3 experienced

What’s that smell?!We purchased a new slice of land next to our playground and Watiti and his building crew very quickly got to work digging the enormous holes before the rains started.

There are no mains sewage systems that are affordable in Namatala so we are building Ventilated Improved Pit (VIP) Latrines. This involves creating a cemented sewage pit with a strong slab and cubicles over the top. All of us are looking forward to their completion so we can close the old toilets once and for all!

Here at Child of Hope, we absolutely love books! Reading for pleasure is pretty much taken for granted

in the UK, but in Uganda most people only ready for necessary information (text books, reports, the Bible, etc).

We believe reading stories is essential for a child’s growth, as not only does it improve their reading ability and vocabulary, but also their imagination and creative thinking – which leads to creative problem-solving.

We are very blessed to have an ever-expanding children’s library (a rarity here in Uganda) and huge thanks go to Pat Morris and her team who organised the container which brought the latest batch of books over to us. The container

did get stuck in customs in Kampala for a few months, but Les Sherlock’s impenetrable packing meant that all our boxes arrived in perfect condition!

In addition to the books, we also received a good quantity of brand new hoodies originally made for a safari park but no longer wanted after re-branding. Our kids are loving their colourful safari jumpers!

Keeping this in mind, our friend Roger Neuberg and his colleagues at the Rotary Club of Oadby have made it their mission to get clean drinking water to everyone in Namatala. In April we took delivery

Filtering away disease of 180 Aquafilter family units and our health and welfare teams are delighted to be working with local community leaders to find homes for them all. These filters are easy to use – dirty water goes in one end and, after a bit of pumping, clean, safe water comes out the other! Families have to be taught how to use them and we’ll be keeping a close eye on the impact that these filters have on the health of the families. Big thanks to Roger and his friends for their vision and generosity.

After looking long and hard at our figures, we delayed our intake of new children who would

usually join our ‘baby class’ of the Child of Hope Nursery in February... and 50 amazing children joined us this May.

We have a long term commitment to our current pupils’ future education – whether this is through ‘O’ and ‘A’ levels or vocational training. We want to take each of them to the point where they can become wage earners and stand on their own two feet.

We were recently privileged to have a visit from Pontypridd Overseas Networking

Trust team (PONT), an organisation twinned with Mbale, Uganda.

The team arrived and divided themselves into 3 groups – ball games, a puppet show and mothers’ crafts. All the children from the youngest in nursery up to the P6s had a fantastic day and a few of the mums enjoyed sharing and

motorbike riders. They all have uniforms, mobile phones for easy communication, first aid training and, most importantly, carry spare helmets for their passengers. So far the businesses are going well and the customer loyalty cards seem to be particularly popular with the passengers. If it continues to succeed then we hope to expand the business, as it not only brings in an income for the rider and his family but also to Child of Hope.

We have been very proud of how our school has developed and grown

from its humble beginnings.

However, there has always been one aspect we have been a bit embarrassed about; our school toilets for the children have been woefully inadequate, and we have been desperate to sort them out so that the children don’t have to queue for so long – and so that the … ummm… smell reduces!

Thankfully our friends at Ernst & Young formed a ‘Beyond Me’ syndicate and kindly agreed to raise funds to improve our facilities.

PONT team bring fun to Mbale!chatting together with the PONT ladies as they made jewellery.

Over lunchtime the clouds came over and there was a huge downpour, turning the playground into a mudpit. With some quick thinking and moving of furniture, we moved the ball games up to our new hall on the top floor of the school. There was a lot of shouting and laughing and very fierce competitions between the groups!

A container full of goodies!

The puppet show was also a huge hit, even with the staff(!) and at the end of the day the teachers had a short session on how to use them. A few days later we had a wonderful phone call from the team who said they wanted to donate the puppets and puppet stage to us so we could continue using them after they had gone back to Wales. A huge thank you to Geoff Lloyd and the PONT team for their kind gifts and a fantastic day!

Each year our expenses go up, (inflation is currently running at around 10% in Uganda), so our costs are high… and with the new intake, we still have 160 children who need sponsors.

If you would like to help us meet our overheads by sponsoring a child, a teacher, food, etc, please sign up on the attached form or via the website.

Thank you so much for your ongoing support – we couldn’t do it without you!

New child sponsors WANTED!

Sponsor me!

Boda Buddies