Support 70 street girls and teen/pre-teen mothers.

This third progressive report serves to update GlobalGiving, donors and whoever who might be interested in Centre Marembo activities on what has been going on during the third term activities with the funds we receive from GlobalGiving both in this term and in recent disbursement.

In the last three months, Centre Marembo has moved forward in terms of improving welfare towards our beneficiaries. Through our aim of transforming the lives of children and young girls who are the victims of rape and other types of violence in the home and on the street, we marked an advancing step in providing better and comfortable services through the basic needs.

Within this term, we were able to pay rent fees for safe homes of the children as well as paying for their nutrition expenses.

With the funds we could receive and accommodate four teen mothers who were experiencing bitter life on the street after being kicked out by their irresponsible parents and so-called guardians.

Instilling positive behaviours through educating and providing professional skills is our priorities, and during this term we initiate the rehab and counselling room to help in rebuilding hope and self-confidence, the moral values for our girls and teen mothers to regain the dignity they lost in the violence at home and on the street to bring them to valuable community members.

We recall you that our priority is to affect a positive and effective change to the lives of the young girls whose background has been marked by the bitterness of the street life lot of traumatic issues and situations. Some of them are continually struggling with the aftermath of that background, some being teen or pre-teen mothers.

The work of Centre Marembo does not only consist of meeting their physiological needs but is also extended to transformative approaches and tips, give back the dignity and human value that they had lost, building their resilience and self-esteem, to shape their future through education and vocational training.

In Health, apart from daily health provisions in Centre Marembo beneficiaries, with the donations raised from GG we help one of our disabled child to undergo for a two-legs operation and she is now recovering.

 OUR SWORT ANALISIS

STRENGHT 

• Being legally known and offered facilities by the central government and local government
• Having been one of the most experienced center in GBV prevention and care for the teen or pre-teen mothers across the country. Our expertise has been shared in policy reform regarding establishments of the guide lines for future institutions
• Having our own sewing workshop which helps our children to acquire adequate skills to be empowered on labour market in tailoring  
• Having a dedicated staff and experienced to provide quality services to the vulnerable children.
• Access to GlobalGiving platform as well as increased visibility through social media locally and internationally.
• Being positive, results driven organization and zeal staff of developing

 WEAKNESS

• Lack of our own schools where Centre Marembo children would go for academic studies without difficulties to achieve maximum goals in education
• Our safe home for the girls is not wide enough to be a conducive for the girls. Centre Marembo pays to the land lord a monthly payment of $500 and this remains a burden to the center as we cannot remodel anything on the facility to secure the girls.  
• We have not enough financial capacity so that we can meet all our beneficiaries’ needs despite a lot of efforts and different initiatives we make.

OPPORTUNITIES

The Centre Marembo has been privileged to access to important opportunities of partnerships locally and globally, some of which are grant based. In this regard, we came into partnership with GG which brought us to be a permanent member whereby we can raise funds of any project and so far, we believe this will swing open the wide horizons to more possible funding opportunities to exit the current situations of financial dependence as well as different threats.

 THREAT

• Big demand of the children (girls) victims who continue to come for seeking refuge at Centre Marembo despite our limited capacity.
• In many cases of abuse around in the community and girls in serious needs of emergency support when we have limited means and ways to be responsive to all their needs. Therefore, that did not prevent us from having a big number of the girls exceeding the capacity of the center. Abused and impregnated teens need more attention and care that requires to be fully equipped. 
• We don’t have constant source of funding that we can rely on in two years ahead.
• Most of funds are short term and are given for achieving a specific activity.
• Lack of our clinic where our children can get fully health services anytime without difficulties as many of them are still experiencing health problems resulted from violence

 Conclusion

However, the challenges we face, we still remain convinced that Our aim is to rebuild hope and self-confidence, the moral values and ethics, to bring back the dignity of girls victims of abuse and domestic violence to mature them into valuable and important community members is our mission; and this could not be possible without your unrivalled support.

Centre Marembo thanks all donors who supported its activities and GlobalGiving for this opportunity to collect funds through such an efficacious fundraising platform.

2^ND PROGRESSIVE REPORT FOR GLOBALGIVING FUNDS

This second progressive report is to update GG, donors and whoever who might be interested in Centre Marembo activity on what has been going on during the second term activities with the funds we receive from GG.

In the last three months Centre Marembo has moved forward with great steps towards a significant change of girls lives. Our aim is to rebuild hope and self-confidence, the moral values and ethics, to bring back the dignity of girls victims of abuse and domestic violence to mature them into valuable and important community members.

We recall you that our priority is to affect a positive and effective change to the lives of the young girls whose background has been marked by the bitterness of the street life lot of traumatic issues and situations. Some of them are continually struggling with the aftermath of that background, some being teen or pre-teen mothers. The work of Centre Marembo does not only consist of meeting their physiological needs but is also extended to transformative approaches and tips, give back the dignity and human value that they had lost, building their resilience and self-esteem, to shape their future through education and vocational training.

To be successful in rehabilitation, we need to emphasize on the behavior change and induct them into a new life where they learn different life skills and cultural values, learn about moral and ethics values.

The teen mothers are given attention and special care with their babies. This is where we have greater challenges as the rehabilitation of the teen and pre-teen mothers goes along with raising their babies. Currently the center is helping three teen mothers and 52 street girls.

Achievements:

Hosting new children 

Since January, the Centre Marembo received new young street girls from the Kigali City Rehabilitation Transit center where are usually collected before centers go to pick them up. 20 children were brought in the center to be rehabilitated and educated. The current number is now 58 girls whose three are mothers.

Nutrition 

Great achievements have been to improve the nutrition for the girls for a better health and the welfare. We have hired a nutritionist who was supervised and technically supported by a specialist nutritionist volunteer from Canada for the last two months. Both have been working hand in hand to sort the nutrition issues at Centre Marembo, scheduling the times and sort of meal to be taken to make sure there is an adequate management of the food items.

Improving the hygienic practices while preparing the meals was another important component of our nutrition. Quality of food was also considered by varying food with increased quantity as well. This has helped the babies and the teen mothers at the center because they need to have enough breast milk for the babies as well as be strong and health themselves.

For that reason, children can have eggs, milk, fruits and vegetables, corn, rice and other local fresh food such as banana, sweet potatoes, cassava and Irish potatoes.

Safe home

Centre Marembo although it has been operating for 13 years, the safe home is still rented and the offices are given by the District to be temporally used. This was successfully covered without any delay to make sure children are stable in a home. This has been a crucial issue since Centre Marembo started operating. The compound we rent comprises two big houses one hosting new comers, girls who need to be helped in a different way, who have great issues to deal with, another house is for the children whose rehabilitation is going on well and who have stability.

As we have children who are affected physically and emotionally, health issues are from time to time rising and require that we have permanent fee to handle them. We could treat 16 children whose health has been going wrong including two who faced psychological matters and needed special treatments. The centre has 9 teen mothers, their babies whose life is fragile and easily affected were also cared for. The better health goes together with a complete and balanced nutrition. As said in nutrition, the funds we received allowed us to shift our nutritional level to the level where children can have an equilibrium in their meals as well as fruits.

Although Centre Marembo has a lot to be proud of, we have been facing great challenges and some of them were tough to solve even led us into failures. Here below is our SWORT to clearly give you the picture of how we cope up with the challenges, how we come up them, the way through which we go to solve and support we get or opportunities we seize. 

OUR SORT ANALISIS

Strengths:

-          Being legally known and offered facilities by the central government and local government

-          Having been one of the most experienced center in GBV prevention and care for the teen or pre-teen mothers across the country. Our expertise has been shared in policy reform regarding establishments of the guide lines for future institutions

-          Having a dedicated staff and experienced to provide quality services to the vulnerable children.

-          Adequate management of the human resources and the center resources

-          Access to GlobalGiving platform as well as increased visibility through social media locally and internationally.

-          Good connection to important networks that raise more awareness of our organization to mobilize resources.

-          Being positive, results driven organization and zeal staff of developing

WEAKNESS

-          Our safe home for the girls is not wide enough to be a conducive for the girls. Centre Marembo pays to the land lord a monthly payment of $500 and this remains a burden to the center as we cannot remodel anything on the facility to secure the girls.  

-          We have not enough financial capacity so that we can meet all needs of our beneficiaries despite of a lot of efforts we make and different initiatives.

OPPORTUNITIES

-          The Centre Marembo has been privileged to access to important opportunities of partnerships locally and globally, some of which are grant based. In this regard, we came into partnership with GG which brought us to be a permanent member whereby we can raise funds of any project and so far, we believe this will swing open the wide horizons to more possible funding opportunities to exit the current situations of financial dependence as well as different threats.

THREAT

-          Big demand of the children (girls) victims who continue to come for seeking refuge at Centre Marembo despite our limited capacity.

-          In many cases of abuse around in the community and girls in serious needs of emergency support when we have limited means and ways to be responsive to all their needs.           Therefore, that did not prevent us from having a big number of the girls exceeding the capacity of the center. Abused and impregnated teens need more attention and care that requires to be fully equipped.  

-          We don’t have constant source of funding that we can rely on in two years ahead.                 

-          Most of funds are short term and are given for achieving a specific activity.

SUCCESSFUL STORIES

UWURUKUNDO Asia story

This teen mother and her sibling Hadidja both ended up in Centre Marembo at the beginning of last year. They were forced to run away from their home to live in street due to the family breakup and a hectic situation of conflicts in her family. As results their father left them and married another wife. The children continued to struggle hard with their mom until when two of them decided to run away to street. At street, she faced a rep and was impregnated, she delivered a baby girl she called Safi.  

The siblings are now pursuing their education and performing well. Asia opted to study in the vocational training where she is getting trained in sewing.  Hadidja is well being rehabilitated and pursue her primary school in primary 5.

UZAMUKUNDA Juliette story 

This young lady lives in Centre Marembo for two years. She is traceless and was brought to the city by a woman who left her in a family and went. Juliette stayed in the family which could not treat her well. She decided to leave the family to leave in the street where the authorities found her and took her into Centre Marembo. Her reintegration will take longer. However, she is performing well at school despite of this affecting situation. We continue to search the family or the relatives using media to trace the family and other ways. She is therefore a good lady who can take the responsibility and is one of the leaders of the girls at the Centre. 

For all we have so far achieved, we are so grateful for all of you who support our work in a way or another to transform the lives of the girls. We cannot succeed without you that why we say " you're so precious to us"

Links:

• Marembo Centre: Transforming lives of sexually abused girls