OCTOBER NEWSLETTER 2018
Hello everyone!
Greetings from Miryante community. We really love you and our best way to share this love is by updating you on how we are doing. Below are the updates:
Education:
This month was the month for parent teacher conferences. We managed to visit our children within this month in their different schools to see their education progress and clear the school dues for remedial lessons to improve on their performance in class as we prepare the candidates for final exams.
We also managed to attend the visitation day at King Solomon College- Kyatega and St. Tomas Junior School and all our children were happy and doing well in School.
This was on the 7th of this month of October. The children were very happy and they all look healthy and the childerns’ performance is good . Below are the pics:
Guardianship Program
In this month ,we carried out baseline surveys of new households that will be added to the guardianship program at the end of this year. This means that we are trying to find relatives or well wishers in the community so that some of the children in the Miryante Orphans Home can transfer to lives with families and receive in-kind support. We want to transition to a foster-care model as much as possible. This survey covered six households from four sub counties i.e.; Mpara, Kakabara, Hapuuyo and Kihuura. We found that two households were not fit for the program because the guardians were too old and couldn’t manage to support the grandchildren and in another home the guardian had issues with substance abuse.
The Objectives of the baseline survey was to find out the information about the potential guardians of these children, to know about the hygiene and sanitation of the households, to find out the financial status of the guardians and to find out the character of the guardians both negative and positive.
Orphan property
This month we managed to save land for three of our children from Hapoyu sub-county. This has been a big problem where an elder brother wanted to sell off the land without considering the sister under our care. We had to get in touch with chairperson LCI and the police so that brother was stopped from selling the land.
We have also advised households to register their property with the LCI chairperson in order to get land titles and proper documents as shown in the pictures below. This is part of the advocacy work we do for our orphans to protect their rights.
Children under guardianship program in their agricultural gardens
Agriculture:
One household which had not caught up with agriculture activities is now doing well. Currently all our households under the guardianship program are doing well.
Next month our Peace Corps volunteer, Alex Rauch, is going to join the program to teach guardians about perma-gardening.
Children under guardianship program in their agricultural gardens:
We also managed to save land for one of our families under the guardianship program. We already have the title as shown below:
Children under guardianship program in their new school uniforms.
Donations
This month Cathy and Terry Dresbach visited us all the way from the United States. These are Laura’s family friends. We were grateful as a community for the wonderful love that the family shared with us.
We received so many gifts from the Dresbach family to our children. These included: field cones, pencils, colors, sharpens , rulers , magnets, writings boards , playing cards ,ropes among others
Some of the gifts brought by Cathy and Terry Dresbach when they visited Miryante Orphanage
Cathy and Terry Dresbach playing with the Children of Miryante during their visit at Miryante Orphanage
Cathy and Terry Dresbach dancing with the Children of Miryante during their visit at Miryante Orphanage
Cathy and Terry Dresbach playing with the Children of Miryante during their visit at Miryante Orphanage
Gardens
The gardens are doing well especially during this rainy season. We planted beans, carrots, pumpkins, eggplants. Our volunteers are doing a great job. Alex our Peace Corps Volunteer planted crops with children. Some children planted maize in their small gardens which is growing. We are harvesting some crops including bananas, sweet potatoes and cassava.
Gardens at the home
Farm
The goats gave birth this month.
We managed to complete the renovation of the house for the herdsmen.
Our rabbits:
The irrigation system is now working already to supply water in the dry season and they are building a fence for the tap. Seedlings are also being transplanted in the main vegetable garden as shown in the pictures below
Technical school: We are so grateful for Root Cause Uganda for the solar panel donation given to our school. We can now type and print documents at Miryante Vocational School because of the strong solar panel installed.
God bless each of you all abundantly!
Miryante Management