Keep her in school

 The communities we serve in Uganda, a simple absence—the lack of a pair of shoes—has quietly determined whether a child attends school or stays home in pain. Many children walk long distances along rough, unpaved paths to reach their classrooms each day. Without shoes, their feet are left exposed to jiggers, cuts, and infections that take root in the soil and spread through daily exposure. What begins as a minor wound often develops into painful sores, swelling, or infection severe enough to keep a child bedridden for days at a time, missing lessons, exams, and the steady rhythm of learning that education depends on.

Because of your generosity, F Ssibu Mission Foundation has been able to close this gap directly. Every pair of shoes you help provide is not simply a piece of clothing; it is a barrier between a child's feet and the conditions that cause infection, and by extension, a safeguard for their health and their place in the classroom. Teachers and community health volunteers have reported fewer instances of foot-related infections among the children who received shoes through your support, and fewer interruptions to their school attendance as a result.

The impact of your giving is measured not only in shoes distributed, but in school days preserved and lives steadied. A child who is not nursing an infected foot is a child who can sit through a full week of lessons, take part in exams, and stay on pace with peers. For girls in particular, consistent attendance is closely tied to long-term retention in school, meaning your support through this initiative is quietly reinforcing the Foundation's broader work in girls' education and school retention.

Through your continued partnership, children who once faced painful infections and missed classrooms are now walking to school safely, attending consistently, and staying healthy enough to learn. Your support is not just providing shoes—it is protecting futures, one child at a time.

For the girls in our Keep Her in School program, staying enrolled depends on more than just a place in the classroom. Many of these girls return home each evening to households with no electricity, where the only light available for homework is a kerosene lamp. These lamps are unreliable and dangerous, and several families in our program areas have experienced burns or house fires caused by a lamp tipping over, often while a child was nearby trying to finish schoolwork.

Through the Solar Lamp Initiative, we have prioritized distributing solar-powered lamps to girls enrolled in Keep Her in School, giving particular attention to households where kerosene use had already led to injury or property damage. Each lamp charges during the day using sunlight and provides several hours of steady, smoke-free light at night, at no ongoing cost to the family.

The results have directly supported our retention goals. Girls with solar lamps are completing more homework in the evenings and arriving at school better prepared, which matters most during the exam periods and transition years when girls are at highest risk of dropping out. Families have also seen reduced spending on kerosene, freeing up limited income for school fees and other essentials. Caregivers have expressed relief at no longer needing to watch over an open flame near their daughters at night.

With continued donor support through GlobalGiving, we aim to extend the Solar Lamp Initiative to more girls in the Keep Her in School program, particularly in the more remote communities of Eastern Uganda, ensuring that no girl has to choose between her education and her safety after dark.