Educate 200 War & HIV/AIDS-Orphaned Ugandan Girl

“Educate 200 War and HIV/AIDS Orphaned Ugandan Girls” is a project that has given hope and a better future through education to more than 150 beneficiaries in northern Uganda, despite the hardships endured due to the absence of their biological parents who they lost either to HIV/AIDS or the 21 years long LRA rebel war.

Some of the beneficiaries due to the effort of the organization (platform for labour action), have managed to get full education scholarship for school fees and only need counseling and scholastic materials for the organization, most of these beneficiaries that require only scholastic materials are secondary going beneficiaries while one girl has managed to get free rehabilitation center from one of the NGO’s here in Lira,

School monitoring visits
11 school monitoring visits were this quarter made to PLA beneficiaries. 21 girls were visited at their respective schools that they enrolled in; the major reason for the visit was to monitor the girls’ school and class room progress. Most of the girls such as Atala , Aygiketty and Morine are steady improving in their performance in class as seen in their [progress reports and teachers comments at the schools.
The girls were visited in their different schools of Lira parents, Lira Police primary school, Lango Quran primary school, Sir Samuel Joe primary school, Adyel primary school, railways primary school, Lira modern primary school, Lira primary school, Railways primary school, Lira Police primary school and secondary schools such as Menta secondary school, Amach complex secondary school and King James secondary school.

During the visits, the beneficiaries were talked to on a one on one basis while sharing their experience about life at and out of school and the difference in their livelihood since PLA’s support and how they feel about the support that they continue to get.

Counseling

All the beneficiaries monitored got counseling services from the organization, some of the beneficiaries were able to share personal issues while the majority had mainly challenges at school psychological support was therefore provided to those children who seem to decline in performance to help them realize the importance of education and thus improve on their performances.

The teachers were too involved in the discussion to work together with PLA staff to ensure the improvement of the beneficiaries in both school and class work. The beneficiaries in schools also discussed their performances and came to better conclusion that they will seek help from their teachers and hold group discussions to help improve on their performances.

Referrals
This quarter due to the referral system, we were able to access food and shelter for 7 children from child restoration centers an organization here in Lira, we have also managed to start rehabilitation for one of the beneficiaries Akullo from Adina rehabilitation center.

Home monitoring visits
3 home visits were made to 5 beneficiaries that were inclusive of Morine, Atai, Ejang, Nebila and Apio.

Additional Visits to beneficiaries such as Immaculate and Fauza were as a result of calls made from their neighbors complaining of the mistreatment of the girls by their guardians, this called for a meeting with the guardian of the girls who pledged to start treating the girls as their own however, hey reported their inability to support the girls financially because themselves cannot afford the basic necessity due to lack of money.
Other beneficiaries such Atai and Morine we visit so as to encourage them to work had at school since they had joined secondary school late after all the students had reported due to challenges.

The girls have been able to improve their performance as evidenced by Morine who managed be in the 24th position out of 211 students in her form one class at King James secondary school, Also Ataiwas in the 48th position out of 119 students in her form two class at Amach Complex secondary school in Lira.

PLANNED ACTIVITIES
PLA will continue to support the girls in providing them with physiological support, scholastic materials and school lunch. Monitoring visits to both the schools and homes will be carried out to analyze the progress of the girls in their performance at home and at school; this will ascertain what kind support the girls need most.
More girls are going to be identified and introduced to the project to with the support from Global Giving donors and well wishers.