United towards Universal Education

A success story: the Christmas bazar in Strassen
In late March, the parish of Strassen presented a check of 8,000 Euros to Unity Foundation. This amount represents the benefit that the organizers have collected during their traditional "Adventsbazar" in December 2012. During the Advent season, the members of the parish of Strassen organize an annual bazar, during which self-made Christmas decorations, home cooked food and other self-made items, e.g. bags made out of recycled. Each year, these objects are sold on behalf of a charity, and we are thankful to have been selected as the beneficiary of their efforts in 2012. Thank you very much!

The primary school in Strassen supports education and development projects
The children of the primary school in Strassen and their teachers recently presented 3 checks in favour of 3 different NGOs, including Unity Foundation, in order to support their education and development priojects. Through various sensitisation projects, the primary school in Strassen, which is part of the Associated Schools of UNESCO, wants to raise the awareness of children regarding poverty. Their support is part of a school project, with the theme "The lifestyle of children in the Third World ". In 2012, Unity Foundation participated in this project by visiting classes and by engaging the children in an interactive dialogue.

Project Visit Central African Republic
From 20 to 28 of February, a delegation of Unity Foundation visited the Central African Republic for a follow-up visit of the “Teacher training and promotion of community schools” project. During the visit the delegation had the opportunity to have consultations with the local partner, meet some authorities of the country, see the teacher training site, and to visit different schools in and around Bangui. This visit has given us the opportunity to get an overview of the achievements in the field and to learn more about the program implemented by the partner, the Foundation Nahid & Hushang Ahdieh (FONAHA).

The main objective of the project in the Central African Republic is to promote preschool and primary education, and it’s in this context that the Foundation offers its training to teachers and encourages the creation of community schools. Since its beginnings in 2004, the Foundation together with the local communities, managed to establish a total of 33 community schools, train about 100 teachers and to enrol approximately 3000 children in school.

As an intern at Unity Foundation, I had the opportunity to accompany Ms. Claudine Winkel, project manager. I am with the Foundation since September 2012, and what I learned so far was very interesting. However, getting the chance to visit a program, to meet the local partners, to see with ones eyes how a project is progressing and how it is received by the population is incomparably rewarding. Or as one of our partners said: "A picture speaks a thousand words, but a picture you took for yourself is infinitely more meaningful."

It was remarkable to see what efforts have been made both by the partner and the local communities to achieve all the objectives of this project and to work towards universal education. We had the chance to meet different people from the school management committees and the school founders who often have come a long way in order to achieve the results which we could bear witness. Listening to the stories we were told, you could really feel the commitment of these people. Some explained that they began to teach in their private home, but as time passed, more and more children attended their classes, so that they decided to make their private homes available in order to create a permanent school for the children of the community. These schools, modest at the beginning, grew and continue growing according to the locally available resources, providing education to more and more children. 

We would like to thank everyone for their warm welcome and their efforts, especially our partner, the FONAHAFoundation for the friendship shown and especially their good work. 
          

                         SINGILA MINGI - THANK YOU VERY MUCH