Help Educate 40 Bright Girls in Lesotho

First of all, let me start this update by again thanking you for supporting the work of Educare Fund. In March this year, many of you rallied round to support the matching fund campaign on GlobalGiving. Some of you were new donors while many had supported our previous campaigns and a number of you have set up regular monthly donations. Regular donations are of great value to Educare Fund because they give a certain amount of stability to our fundraising by providing a guaranteed minimum monthly income. Your donations continue to change the lives of young women in Lesotho. Many of the girls you are helping support would otherwise be denied the opportunity for further education simply because of family poverty.

During my visit to Lesotho in December 2015, a colleague and I visited St Mary’s High School where Alice, one of the girls sponsored by Educare Fund currently attends. The specific reason for the visit was that this particular girl had shown rather disappointing performance at the mid-year exams held in June every year. These exams are used by schools to get an idea of how the student might perform in the end of the year exams especially in years 10 and 12. The feedback from these exams enables the school to identify gaps in the student’s learning so that remedial action can be taken. Our visit with Alice gave us the opportunity to find out why she was no longer getting good results. It turned out that her mother was very sick and the girl, on top of having to care for her mother, was herself really worried about her health. This was definitely having an adverse effect on Alice’s studies.

The good news is that at the end of the year Alice did pick up on her studies and obtained a rather good 2^nd class pass. Her story of being a young carer is unfortunately not unique as it is not uncommon for girls of her age to have to care either for a sick parent and sometimes younger siblings as well. This responsibility for younger siblings is indeed the case for Timello. Here’s what she says:

My father died 12 years ago and since then my mother has been struggling to make ends meet. \it has been very difficult for her to pay my school fees especially since I got to high school. In the end she had to go look for work in South Africa (slightly better paid) and now I am left with the responsibility of looking after my younger brother and sister.

At sixteen years of age, it would be hard enough for Timello to have sole responsibility for herself, let alone having to take care of younger siblings. Needless to say, without your help, she would have the added burden of worrying about whether or not her school fees would be paid. This would clearly have a huge negative impact on her performance at school.

Attached to this report is the video recorded at St Mary’s High School. The girls hope that you enjoy their singing. We certainly did.

Here's the YouTube link for the video:

https://youtu.be/CW_g_1nrH2w

I hope you enjoy it!

Till next time.

Warm regards

Liphethiso Monica Harris