Currently: trying to wake up for the day... maybe I should go get some coffee.
Every year, Bingham sends out their middle and high school
students all around the country to participate in a week-long service learning
trip. This year, I joined twelve tenth graders and two teachers and headed to
Southern Ethiopia to work an NGO, Tearfund out of the UK.
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| A few of the students with one of the Self Help groups |
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| One of the precious little girls in one of the villages we were learning in |
In Soddo and Nazaret,
Tearfund has partnered with local organizations to create self-help groups. The
purpose of these groups is empower its members, usually women, to start a
method for saving money, which is not common in this culture. The members agree
to save a certain amount of money every week and are accountable to one another
for that amount. Once they have saved up enough, they can loan it out to one
another for income-generating projects that work to support their families and their
community.
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| My group of students with another self help group. It's so encouraging to hear how these ladies have worked to pull their families out of poverty! |
Our
students learned about these groups and hope to use this information in the
future in some way. Whether instructing their classmates or working with groups
here in Addis, the hope for this group is that their learning can become
reality.
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| The whole group with our Tearfund partners |
