By Michael H. Varhola | President, Solar Empowerment Initiative
Our main effort during this reporting period has been to provide solar lanterns to orphans in Sierra Leone. We did this in cooperation with our partner Ambreen Rizvi, who is the Founder and President of The Brigade of Mercy (BOM), a 501c3 based in McLean, VA. Basically, we provide the lanterns, and BOM handles everything else. This not only holds down our overhead, it extends our reach into parts of the world that we would not otherwise get to. Here is the report from Ambreen:
The solar lights support an orphanage and day school named Sonnia House in Mattru Jong District, Sierra Leone. There are 130 children which come daily there while 30 or so live there. There are no lights in the orphanage. The solar lights help to light the 8 rooms which host the kids. The bigger lanterns help in the living room and the smaller ones help in the bedrooms so children can do homework and read. They help the orphanage with lighting in general.
Every $10 donation will buy three small lanterns like the ones you see in the pictures. Our larger model, which Ambreen also refers to, has a separate solar panel plus a USB port. It can light up a small room. It costs $12.50.
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