Give 420 Girls in Tanzania Their Own School

We have accomplished so much at the Milembe Girls School thanks to your help! We just returned from visiting the school and were thrilled to see in person the new science laboratories and composting latrines built with your assistance. We wish you could have been there to see the girls sitting at the laboratory benches working on experiments. The buildings are simply beautiful and it was deeply moving to see the girls learning science through hands-on work! The faucets at the lab benches now have running water through the new gravity rainwater catchment system (which is not common in this rural region).

We are now getting ready to build a teacher’s house at the Milembe campus with support from the United States Embassy in Dar es Salaam. As we build this house, we are actively continuing our fundraising efforts to get ready for Phase 2 at the school, which will include a dormitory for 40 girls, dining hall and kitchen, and administrative offices for the teachers. Dormitories are desperately needed in Tanzania. Girls face so many hardships and obstacles in getting an education. Dropout rates of girls in Tanzania are extreme with only 1 to 4% of girls completing school through Form 4 (the equivalent of 11^th grade in U.S. schools).

“It’s so hard to get an education with so little free time,” Winfrida, a Form 3 student at Milembe, told us. After helping with her four younger brothers in the morning, she walks over an hour to get to school. She loves learning and being at school is the highlight of her day. After her schoolday and the long walk back home, she is still responsible for caring for her younger brothers, walking the long distance to the well to get water, going to the market to get food, cooking dinner for her family, washing all the dishes and helping put her brothers to bed. If she’s not too exhausted, she can then begin her homework. 

Despite her workload, Winfrida comes to school every day eager to learn. She told us: “If I can get an education, I know it will help improve my life.” Dayana Kuboja, the Misungwi District Education Officer, said that dormitories at the area secondary schools would decrease the high dropout rates for girls. Having housing for girls so that they can live at school and focus on their education would ensure that more girls can finish school and have a chance for a better life.

Donations like yours are making education a reality for girls like Winfrida. We have learned that when a girl receives an education, she is more likely to provide for her family and send her own children to school, thus reducing the cycle of poverty. By supporting the education of even one girl, you are helping to end this cycle. Thanks to your support, students like Winfrida have a school where they can excel. With your help, we hope that they can soon have a safe space at their school to live and be able to focus on their studies. Stay tuned—we can’t wait to tell you about the continued success of Milembe School!

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