Background: Uganda has one of the largest youngest populations in the world, with over 56% of its population under the age of 18. Children are also the largest demographic group living in poverty. Early learning and development is compromised in Uganda by lack of pre-school and other early childhood development programmes and qualified teachers. Only one out of ten children between 3 and 5 years of age is enrolled in preschool education. 67% of children living in Kampala (Uganda’s capital) slums do not attend school and of those that do attend, only 53% complete and 34% go onto complete secondary school. Every child has the desire and need to go to school, but not the ability, hence the urgent need to support their education which has culminated into the “JOY of Learning”
The Project: This project initiated in August 2020 and delivers basic education to the poorest of children living in one of the slums of Uganda’s capital (Kampala) in an informal setting. The joy of learning is an interim project to educate these children until sponsorship can be found for them to attend formal education. Some of these children have this year moved into our Kosovo Education project and will now be sponsored through school. The feedback from our Trusted advisor (Ronald) is that this project has been a huge success and there are many children in the Kosovo slum keen to join it. We adapted the project so that it was able to run despite the COVID19 restrictions in place in Uganda (schools remained closed). Ronald has highlighted that this project provides an excellent stepping stone for children back into formal education. Despite our initial plan for this to be an ‘interim project’ we hope to continue funding this project as there is a huge demand for it.
We receive quarterly reports and photographs from Ronald on the progress of this project.