From the President
In this newsletter we are sharing with you some of the recent highlights of our East African scholarship program. One of these highlights was the wonderful experience we had this winter when the board members hosted Sister Salome Nnambi, our Ugandan scholarship coordinator, during her first visit to Massachusetts. As you know, we have a staff of three in-country scholarship coordinators in East Africa – a coordinator in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. One of our GTL strategic plan objectives is to have our in-country coordinators visit stateside at least once during their tenure. The visits provide these caretakers of our scholarship programs in East Africa the opportunity to see first hand how our stateside organization’s work takes place. It provides us with the opportunity to share ideas and insights together and then to jointly plan how we can continue the remarkable progress of our small, but growing, organization. GTL, in addition to our primary mission of providing scholarships to qualified girls and young women for their secondary education, also has a goal to encourage cross-cultural exchange of information and ideas between countries. Coordinators’ visits provide a valuable forum for further binding us together as we work to continuously improve our program so that we can provide additional scholarships.
During her visit, Sister participated in three very successful fundraisers hosted by board members. This afforded her the opportunity to meet face-to-face with potential donors. Listening to Sister’s description of her everyday challenges because of her country’s extreme poverty inspired many participants at these events to become new donors. I know that Sister was extremely impressed at our donors’ generosity. She stated that before her visit she believed that US donors gave from their excess monies; but when she actually met with donors at these fundraisers she learned that many donors truly stretch their resources to contribute to our GTL scholarship work. I know this was a valuable lesson learned by her and impressed her very much. She talked about it on several occasions during her visit. It is one of the important messages that she will bring back with her to Uganda to share with our school headmistresses, our students and other in-country GTL supporters.
For me, a large number of new donors at our fundraising events demonstrate that GTL is doing the right thing, the right way and at the right time to help improve educational opportunities in East Africa. We are all learning together that it is no longer possible, practical, or moral to ignore the plight of those less fortunate than ourselves. In order for the world to truly become a global village, each of us must identify our unique role in helping to change the relations between the developed and undeveloped regions of our world. As our donors, one way you have chosen to help is to support our GTL mission. Your continuing commitment and support have been critical to ensuring our ability to pursue our organization’s challenging vision to provide girls and young women with the education they need to realize their own potential and fulfill their aspiration for themselves, their families, and their community. On behalf of the entire board of directors, I salute you and thank you, for helping us to make a real difference for our scholarship students – girls and young women who would not be attending secondary schools without our financial support.
Included in this publication is important information on the issues that continue to significantly impact the gender disparity that exists between boys and girls in our East Africa countries. These issues pose serious ongoing barriers to students who are seeking empowerment through education. We are also publishing several social and economic demographic comparisons that help us understand some key similarities and differences between the US and our East African GTL countries.
