To our Majengo family,
On behalf of all the children, families and staff at Majengo Children’s Home in Tanzania, thank you for your kindness and generosity over the last 12 months. This year brought a lot of challenges, and your support has made a significant and meaningful impact in the Majengo community. For this, we are so grateful.
While 2020 tested us all, it also allowed MCH to expand our community outreach beyond anything we could have imagined. We have helped equip over 10,000 children and families with the provisions and education required to navigate the ongoing pandemic. We enabled all of the children supported by Majengo’s programming to reach their full potential despite many difficulties – all thanks to you.
Ensuring MCH can continue to thrive in the face of hardship is critical for 2021. Though no one can predict what this year will bring, we are committed to serving those in need in the community. We will also continue to provide a high standard of support for all the children in our home and extend programming to many families and youth in the community in new and creative ways.
We appreciate all of your contributions and good wishes, which have made an incredible impact in the Majengo community. You have shown thousands of children and families that people around the world care.
We have attached an overview of some of our 2020 accomplishments made possible by your support. Stay tuned for our February newsletter which will outline some of our focuses for 2021.
With great love and thanks from all of us at Majengo.
We had many plans going into 2020, and when the world told us to be flexible and creative, we listened. Thanks to your support, we were able to complete a number of our planned projects and design and implement several new programs along the way. In addition to all our COVID-19 facing programming, we were able to do the following:
School Improvement Projects: The School Improvement Projects were completed in the final quarter of 2020. Partnering with 3 local secondary schools and 1 primary school, we built new beds, a new dormitory, a new water system and a new bathroom. These projects helped over 1,165 children (including students from MCH) gain access to better quality facilities at the schools they attend.
Financial Training Program: Our Financial Training Program took place at the end of the year and included 60 participants from the surrounding community. Over two days, 6 bankers and 3 microfinance experts trained all 60 participants on budgeting, financial management, banking and microfinance. Our hope is to continue these trainings next year and help community members open bank accounts and start small businesses.
Mental Health Counselling Programs: At the end of 2019, we decided to focus on mental health and wellness at Majengo. With the support of the Arusha Mental Health Institution, we provided training to the staff and children at Majengo and provided children in need, or children who were interested in, counselling with professionals through the hospital. This was incredibly helpful for many, and we will continue to promote this program in the coming years.
Clean Water Initiative: Our water system at Majengo was deemed unsatisfactory in providing enough safe water to the children – an even bigger problem when all the students were home during lockdown. With the support of many local tradesmen, and a couple of generous donors, we were not only able to repair our current system, but we were also able to install a reserve for back up water and a water harvesting system to promote more sustainable water use during the rainy season (and prevent floods!).
Pre-School Food Security Program: When the Majengo students returned to school after lockdown, our garden had flourished and we had too much food for the number of kids at the centre. We began our Pre-School Food Security Program, which provides food subsidies to our students on a regular basis. We hope to continue this program next year.
We also would like to strengthen our community engagement and support, and we have a handful of special projects to help us do that. Our main focus is ensuring all the MCH programs remain in place, while not reducing our capacity.Our wishes for 2021 are two-fold.
Stay tuned for next month’s newsletter outlining how you can help make 2021 another successful and bright year at Majengo.
Thank you for your donations.
