Is it crazy to say GivingTuesday is one of my favorite days of the year?
Then let me be crazy.
This year, I’m super excited to share a bit about what World Vision, a great organization I care about immensely, is doing in Zambia. If you know anything about my story, I got my start as a social entrepreneur in Kenya working with orphaned and vulnerable children, so work of this kind on that special continent is close to my heart.
World Vision is currently in its fourth year running a partnership with Thirty-One Gifts to bring school bags to girls in rural Zambia through part of their girls’ education program.
Below, you can see some photos of a recent trip that one staff member took to a school to see some of the girls who were recipients of the school bag program.
In July, World Vision staffer Deborah Johns visited Chipapa Primary School, which is in a remote village two hours outside of Lusaka, Zambia. On her visit, she saw tons of young girls carrying their school supplies in totes donated by Thirty-One Gifts. In partnership with the Ministry of Education, World Vision uses these totes as a special incentive for young girls to stay in school.
©2017 World Vision/photo by Deb Johns
Why does this work?
Chipapa Primary School has about 4 classrooms for 942 students (454 girls and 488 boys), ranging in grades from 1-9. World Vision started supporting the school with basic supplies, clean water, and a curriculum designed to increase health, literacy, and attendance. But they also saw they needed to do something specific for girls. In this rural community, girls start dropping out of school around grade five due to a number of reasons.
Things like:
- The family needs her to stay home and care for their younger siblings.
- She starts menstruating and is ill-equipped to attend class due to a lack of proper hygiene and sanitation facilities, including clean water.
- She is forced into early marriage.
- She must walk too far to get water (taking up most of her day.)
And it’s no simple matter. Girls dropping out of school is a life and death issue; a child born to a literate mother is 50% more likely to survive past the age of five.
At the school (as you can see in the pictures) Deborah saw first-hand how this donation of totes from Thirty-One Gifts was encouraging girls to continue in their education.
Irene (9 years old) and Nelia (8 years old) received their “school bags” last year. “They were so proud to show them off!” Deborah wrote. “I could tell the totes were treasured possessions and that they were thankful for the gift.”
©2017 World Vision/photo by Deb Johns
How you can help:
Today is Giving Tuesday!
For the fourth consecutive year, World Vision and Thirty-One Gifts have partnered to double the impact made by donors’ Giving Tuesday gifts. Any gift given to World Vision today will be matched with a donation of product from Thirty-One Gifts up to $1,000,000, so any donation you make will have twice the impact for helping families in need around the world.
(The Thirty-One Gifts school bags that Irene and Nelia were so proud to show off to Deb were given to World Vision to match generous donations on Giving Tuesday last year.)
You can choose any item to donate through World Vision today, but if you want to make a direct donation to help girls stay in school, I recommend their Education for Girls fund!
