While we were working in the office this week, Jayme and I took a look back at the first six months of the year and asked ourselves: in 2022 so far, what has the Far Away Friends community been able to accomplish together? We were BLOWN AWAY by the result! Your support since January this year has funded some truly amazing projects on the ground in Uganda, and we wanted to take you through a quick tour of just some of the dreams you’ve made a reality in 2022.

Below is a quick glance of the projects we’ve been able to complete in just the first six months of this year! For a more in-depth look, keep reading!

The entire student body and staff of Global Leaders Primary School, 2022

Welcoming Students Back to School

Uganda had the longest COVID lockdown in the world, meaning that students remained out of school for over two years. In January of this year, we were finally able to welcome students back to Global Leaders Primary School, and what a welcome it was! Pre-Covid, Global Leaders enrollment stood at around 200 students; in January of 2022, we more than doubled that number, and now educate 500 students daily. This means more students than ever are receiving high quality primary education, and are beginning the path to breaking cycles of generational poverty forever.

Market Day Fund & School Lunch Program

With 500 new students came 500 minds hungry for knowledge – and 500 Kindergarten through seventh graders hungry for lunch! With food prices skyrocketing in Ugandan, funding our meal program became more important – and difficult – than ever.

Thanks to our amazing community, however, we were able to SELL OUT Market Day Fund for the second year in a row! You purchased over $10,000 worth of food and other essential goods, which was nearly 375 items in total, meaning you provided nearly 35,000 school lunches to students at GLP in term one alone.

Psychosocial Support & Child Protection Training for Teachers

For teachers and students alike, coming back to school after COVID lockdowns was a difficult process. Students all over the world experienced varying levels of support and hardship through the last two years, and teachers everywhere felt the pressure to show up for kids in ways they never had to think about before.

Click above to see district teachers participating in a multimodal training on psychosocial support and child protection!

Because of this, our teachers in Uganda requested a Psychosocial Support & Child Protection Training in order to be able to support students mental health, provide students with the emotional support they needed, and be able to identify signs of abuse or neglect, as well as design and implement a system to report it. We were able to provide this training in February of this year, to teachers who impact nearly 3000 students across the district. You helped create safer spaces for students in rural communities this year through your continued support!

Construction of our Income-Generating Maize Mill

Maize Mill, mid-construction earlier this year

In the summer of 2021, our community came together once again for our annual 5k fundraiser! This year, we were working to raise money for the construction of a maize mill in Amolatar. The impact of this project will be two-fold: first, it keeps local dollars in local hands by allowing merchants and farmers to grind their maize in the community, rather than paying to do so in a nearby city. Second, this will serve as an income generating project for Global Leaders Primary School and Far Away Friends Uganda, bringing us one step closer to long-term sustainability.

The Maize Mill is expected to be operational by the end of the summer!

Pen Pal Program Re-Launch

Students at one of our US partner schools with their completed pen pal letter responses, ready to send to Uganda!

After a two year hiatus, we were finally able to relaunch our pen pal program, one of our oldest (and favorite) traditions. Each of our six partner schools in Uganda are paired with one of our partner schools in the US, and students write to each other about their experiences in their respective countries. Through our Schools for Schools program, we were able to run clubs in our six US schools across four states from January to May, and educate US students on Do No Harm Development, the dangers of white saviorism, and the importance of local leadership and partnership over charity. This kind of cultural exchange is at the heart of who we are at Far Away Friends, and relaunching this program in April was a much needed reminder of that.

Development of our Skills for Life Curriculum

An excerpt form Far Away Friends’ Skills for Life curriculum, showing an example of several of the activities students in Uganda will participate in!

As a component of our Schools for School program, we co-developed – in partnership with local leaders and educational consultants – a 200+ page Skills for Life Curriculum that aims to equip students with a variety of life skills, from building healthy relationships and confidence to managing health and finances. This curriculum will assist in our goal of dropping teen pregnancy rates and raising school enrollment in the community at large.

Skills for Life Teacher Training

Click above to watch co-founder Collines Angwech introduce our Skills for Life teacher training!

This past month, your support funded a teacher training on our Skills for Life Curriculum, where we invited twelve teachers from our six partner schools to learn how to implement the curriculum and steward the program in their own schools and classrooms. We have always been committed to the equitable pay and continued professional development of as many teachers as we can reach in the Amolatar district, and this training was another step toward the path to prosperity for every student.

New Photos from the Field

We also received beautiful new photos and videos from the ground, in partnership with photographer/videographer Bob Ditty! You can see his work on our recent Instagram posts, our website, and in the gallery below!

Your support throughout this past year has made all the difference, and has had a significant and tangible difference on the ground in Uganda. These programs have affected the lives of so many people in this community, and continues to put hundreds of kids on the path to prosperity. Thank you for being an interrupter — an interrupter of injustice, of cycles of poverty, of a story students and families in Namasale have been written into for generations.

Our Advocate Community is helping us make an even greater impact in the second half of the year (and trust me, you’re going to want to be a part of the amazing things we have coming next). Click below to learn more about how you can support our programs!

Become an advocate