A letter from, Terra Lorenz

Our number one goal for 2022 is to get children back in school!

Uganda’s president has said that schools will open again in January 2022! Come January, Uganda’s schools will have been in partial or total closure for 18 months. 15 million children will have been completely out of school for 18 months! The U.N. cultural agency has stated that this is the longest disruption in education anywhere in the world.

For the marginalized, schools are much more than a place to receive an education. For example, at our school children are guaranteed to receive breakfast and lunch for day students, as well as supper for boarding students. Many have told us they only receive one meal a day while at home. Many have also reported that they have had to enter into child labor to help support their families, primarily to provide food for their families.

The Ugandan government agency, the National Planning Authority, reported that “30 percent of learners are likely not to return to school forever”. This is very much in line with our own findings. Our director, Paul Bogere, has shared that many of our previous students believe they have grown too big to go back to school after this extended closure.

Another reason for students not returning to school is teen pregnancy. It was reported that there was a 22.5% increase between March 2020 and June 2021 in pregnancy among girls aged 10-24 seeking first antenatal care. It is now said that nearly 1 in 3 teenage girls will become pregnant. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) cites growing poverty in Uganda as one reason for rising teen pregnancy rates. We have seen this in our own communities. After the first extended lock-down period the government first re-opened the Primary 7 class (similar to grades 6 and 7 in Canada/US). We were thankful to welcome these students back. For the first time ever, five of our students that came back were found to be pregnant. In all of our years of operating, we have only ever had one student found to be pregnant in this class. As this was earlier on in the pandemic, we have only seen this increase as students have remained home in vulnerable situations. Without the safe haven of school and the hope of a better future, Ugandan girls have become much more marginalized and vulnerable.

In our area, many of the private schools will not open again. We have seen many schools go up for sale. Private schools are run primarily from the tuition students pay with no support from the government. Our school is like this, though we also provide support for children who can’t afford to pay tuition. This is one way we aim to become fully sustainable. The National Planning Authority in Uganda reported that 3,507 primary schools and 832 secondary schools in the country were likely to close due to school lockdowns. Before the school lockdowns in Uganda, 1/3 of our funding came from our school fees. Without our donors' support, our school could also face the same fate.

The need for safe schools providing quality education is greater than ever. Our director, Paul Bogere, said “January is going to be very difficult as we try to re-open, but if we can make it through January, I know our school will continue to grow and get much closer to being self-sustaining. So many families have told us they will be sending their children to our school.” January will be difficult due to all of the costs involved with re-opening and without yet having the financial support from tuition. Our school will need to be equipped with the resources and support required to meet the standard operating procedures (SOPs), all of the added space and sanitation Covid-19 protocols, as well as all the staff requirements and needs.

In 2022, our hope is that our focus will shift from providing aid and responding to Covid-19 lockdowns to focusing on self-sustainability. We do not want to see donations going into sustaining our primary school forever. The first step is to equip our school so that is has the capacity and infrastructure to reach self-sustainability.

Before we can focus on sustainability, we need to focus on the safety of our children and getting them back in school. Truly, in this unique time, we find ourselves in, every little bit of support is needed to help us secure the future of Uganda's most precious resource, its' children.

To our dear and beloved partners,