Help provide food packages to vulnerable families in Uganda
Donation protected
Hello! My name is Cara and I am currently volunteering in a small village called Naja, in the Buikwe district of central Uganda. I have been living and teaching at KIDA Elementary School, a day and boarding school aiming to provide quality education to underprivileged and vulnerable children aged 2-14 years. Many of these children continue to experience unimaginable hardships every day and live in a severe state of poverty.
The school makes up a small part of the incredible non-profit organisation I am working with, the Katosi Intercommunity Development Alliance (KIDA).
KIDA was founded in 2012, with a mission to address entrenched poverty in the communities of Uganda like Katosi, a landing site on Lake Victoria with 17 villages which were hard-hit by HIV/AIDS pandemic and contained numerous orphans who were victims of child labor.
Over the past 12 years, KIDA has worked tirelessly with a team of community-minded professionals and volunteers, to create equal opportunities for all, and improve the lives of these seriously underprivileged individuals.
KIDA worked to recruit extremely selfless carers in the community to take these abandoned children in as their own, and provide these families with basic needs and a quality education.
Since 2012, they have transformed lives through early education support, with 400+ children enrolled to their school project, as well as their vocational training program with young mothers trained and empowered to start businesses, empowering community groups through skills training, savings and crediting that has transformed financial status for over 100 families.
Some of these children are now enrolled at KIDA elementary, which was opened in 2021, with the income received from fee-paying students providing bursaries, but as a small school with no external funding, they can only accommodate so many. Other children remain placed by the organisation in similar schools across the district, either boarding or as day students living with these care takers. At school, the children are provided not only a much needed education, but also 3 meals per day.
However, when these children return to their foster homes during school holidays, it places extreme stress on the incredibly selfless care takers who often take in 10+ children each. KIDA aims to provide basic needs to these children when they are not at school as well, during the holiday breaks in December and August, through the provision of basic food packages to the 43+ families to allow them to feed the children over the break. As a non-profit organisation however, KIDA lacks the funding to do so, and relies on external donations, both within their community and abroad.
As such, I am requesting anyone in the position to do so consider making a donation to allow us to purchase, assemble and distribute food packages to these families over the next few weeks before the term ends. We will aim to provide a food package consisting of a minimum of sufficient quantities of rice, beans, maize flour and vegetable oil, as well as soap bars for bathing and washing clothes. If you cannot/don’t wish to donate, I request you consider sharing this link to those in your life who may.
Any extra funds received will be saved to be used for the same purpose over the Christmas break, which is 8 weeks long and thus places even greater stress on these carers and the organisation who endeavours to not let a single child go hungry, particularly over Christmas time, when so many of us are celebrating abundance.
I am hopeful that I will still be in Uganda when it comes time to distribute these supplies amongst the community, but regardless, you will be kept well informed of where these packages are going and the immense impact they will have on these people.
To follow along, check out KIDA on:
Organizer
Cara Metcalf
Organizer
North Willoughby, NSW