We deeply regret to inform you of the unexpected and tragic passing of our inspirational Founder, Gret Glyer.
The DonorSee team is in shock. Our thoughts, love, prayers, and support are with Gret’s beloved wife Heather, his children, and family and friends.
We ask that you keep them in your prayers at this time.
Over the coming days, we will follow up with more details.
Sincerely, Patrick Weeks Chairman, DonorSee.
I spoke with Gret a number of times, and his enthusiasm and vision permeated DonorSee. He had a big vision, but was also open to suggestions and ideas to make the platform better for donors and partners alike.
I know his family, friends, and the DonorSee team would appreciate your thoughts and prayers right now.
When I was in grad school in Pensacola many moons ago, a big ship ran into the bridge going over to the beach and broke it. It caused huge issues, since many people commuted to work. Ferries had to be set up, etc. But the “best part” was that, within 24 hours, some bright lad or lass was selling tee shirts that said, “I was there when the ship hit the span.” Brilliant – I’m sure they made a killing!
That phrase has stuck in my head in the nearly 40 years since, as the “nice way” to say, well, the other phrase about bad events.
The last 10 days have been one slow-moving ship aiming at the span.
the 16 year old girl raped and impregnated by her father
one of our Literacy program students becoming homeless and living in a church with her family
another Lit student whose aunt is trying to prostitute her to bring in money for food
Now, our landlord didn’t pay his property tax bill in conjunction with a broke KCCA desperate for money which has suddenly “reassessed the value.” The gate to our compound has been sealed and the water turned off until we pay a month’s rent 2 months in advance so he can pay off the debt
My staff is exhausted, Ronald is frustrated, and I am ready to head to the beach and stay there! And then there’s the state of the economy in general, both here and there… Which is better not thought about, to be honest.
In our 13 1/2 years working in Namuwongo, this isn’t the first crappy week. We’ve had people’s homes bulldozed in the middle of the night. Two years of incredibly harsh (and even more incredibly harshly enforced) lockdowns. Primary school girls sold off as brides. Fathers shot and killed for poaching to feed their family.
It’s HARD.
And yet, it’s these hard things, these TIA things (This Is Africa), these frustrations and set backs, that make all the GOOD things so sweet. All the laughter more joyous. All the accomplishments more amazing.
I’m incredibly proud of our team, our work, and how far we’ve come. I’m incredibly grateful for all of you who have come alongside to help us — in the hard things and the great things. We really can’t thank you enough!
Webele nyo,
Jennings
PS We have a lot of “hard things” projects up right now on DonorSee, and we’re close to our June goal of crossing $30,000 raised on the platform. Even $10 goes a long way — please click below to see the projects! 100% goes to the program.
Back in August, we got invited to chat with DonorSee to see about becoming one of their partner organizations. I’d never heard of them before, but Mikkel (our newest board member) had done a podcast with DonorSee’s founder Grett, which led to the connection.
Long story short, we did our trial private project, got that funded, and launched site-wide in September. It was a pretty steep learning curve, but we were determined to figure it all out — and here we are!
TO DATE, we have:
Had 117 projects funded
Raised almost $29,000 (at the time of this writing)
Seriously, maybe I need to go away more often because just in the time I was on my trip, we raised nearly $4000 on DonorSee!
FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS! Wow. I’m blown away!
What did you accomplish?
blackboards for the new Wells of Hope Primary building
a substantial start on part 1 of desks and chairs for the building
orphan Miriam’s medical care after she was hit by a boda
almost 60% of the transportation for Kellen to her father’s burial
medical care for teen mom Mabel’s two sick children
a metal crutch for Emmanuel, who was born with one leg
help for Clare, the teen mom living in the chicken coop
an exit package for teen mom Gloria, to set her up for independence
restocking food for our teen girls
mosquito nets for 25 students in Skills for Life
an emergency intake for 15-year-old pregnant teen Sylvia
a 4-bed dormitory for homeless students in Skills for Life
medical treatment for Jen’s UTI
Y’all, I was only gone 2 1/2 weeks! THIS.IS.AMAZING!!
Your support while I was gone, beyond this amazing giving, was so appreciated. I got emails and messages on social media, and it was so encouraging. Because it’s hard over there…
Great. But hard. Thanks to all of you, the trip was a success in every way. I really can’t thank you enough!
Webele nyo!
Jennings
PS Becoming a monthly supporter is a GREAT way to help our work! As little as $10 a month makes an impact — $10 can provide food for a teen mom and her child for a week! Just click the button to get started —>
Emmanuel (Manuel for short) is in Primary 3 at Wells of Hope, and so happy that school started back in January after nearly two years of closures. He loves running around, playing football, and being a regular kid.
There’s just one difference: Manuel has only one leg.
He was born this way, and watching him move you would never really connect that one of his “legs” is actually a crutch. He uses that crutch as easily and naturally as can be — it’s pretty amazing.
But Manuel’s crutches have always been made out of wood, and as a typical, active boy, that wood breaks. When that happens, Manuel can spend a week out of school while another one is located, and funds figured out.
This means he not only loses a valuable week of education and food, he also has no means of movement outside sitting on his bum and scooting around. His family couldn’t afford a wheelchair, but also, his home and the surrounding village aren’t really places a wheelchair can go easily. So he waits.
We have a project up on DonorSee to buy Manuel a metal crutch, so he can play football and run to his heart’s content. We’d love your help to give this amazing kid an amazing gift.
I’m a mom, although all my kids are adults now. It was great when they were at home! It was also ALL THE THINGS: loud, too quiet (what are they up to now?!), hilarious, emotional, frustrating, wonderful, joyous, instructional, mystifying, magical… Being a parent will certainly expand your emotional repertoire!
This weekend, we celebrate the courage, love, dedication, and hard work of all our girls who had babies too soon.
Who are just kids themselves, but who are dedicated to providing a better life for their children.
Who go to class with a baby strapped to their back, persevere through bouts of crying, stay up all night with a sick baby but get to class the next day anyway.
Being a mom is, well, all the things. We hope that, for our teen moms, it’s mostly joy.
Thank you for your support of the Ross and Suubi Houses, as well as Skills for Life. You are changing lives every day.
PS Gloria is a 17 year old teen mom who has lived at the Ross and Suubi Houses for over a year. She is saving money to be able to move out on her own soon. We’re so proud of her! You can help us give her a leaving package to help with her independent life.
Last week we had 7 girls to come to the Haven Clinic with malaria. Nurse Sherry didn’t get her Sunday off, because she was tending to all the cases!
The treatment for malaria is a week-long course of IV infusions. It requires a temporary canula that is left in for the whole course of treatment, as well as the nurse to administer the medication. With 7 girls currently receiving treatment, that’s a lot of medicine and supplies!
Malaria makes you feel terrible, but left untreated it can cause brain damage, or lie dormant in the liver only to cause relapse and illness later. We had a boy in the basketball camp we held in 2013 who had been quite severely impacted by cognitive impairment due to untreated malaria.
Why now?
It’s rainy season, and that means lots of puddles, filled drainage ditches, and other areas of stagnant water. While we have mosquito nets in our residential houses, those do get torn, or mosquitoes can be trapped inside during the day.
Currently, the tailoring class is repairing all of our mosquito nets, but that still leaves all the girls in our program who go home to houses without. We have a project up on DonorSee right now for 25 nets, the first effort to get nets to 100% of our students and staff.
You can help – a donation of any size gets us closer to a net for everyone!
Late last year, we posted our first big project on DonorSee – a computer lab for Skills for Life. This $10,000 project was highly ambitious for us, and to be honest, it has been slow going.
WHY do we feel strongly about introducing digital literacy to our community?
Many of Uganda’s government services have moved online, such as National ID registration.
Many good jobs require online applications, as well as basic computer skills.
Having knowledge of digital applications like Microsoft’s Office Suite vastly broadens the kinds of jobs open to our girls.
Digital literacy allows our girls to fully participate in civic life in their communities.
And NOW… thanks to two Roberts who each made a huge donation within 24 hours of each other…
IT’S FUNDED!
For a whole year, including electricity, maintenance, and the teacher’s salary!
We are a small organization — small but mighty! For us, $10,000 is HUGE. And YOU made it happen!
We really can’t say THANK YOU enough! Webele nyo!
Blessings,
Jennings
PS While we no longer have a big project up on DonorSee, we have plenty of small ones, from tailoring supplies to restocking the food for our daycare. 100% goes to the program — if you have any questions, just use the Contact screen and ask away!
When we began using DonorSee in September 2021, we really had no idea what we were doing. (I mean REALLY…!) It’s a truly unique fundraising platform that relies on lots and lots of relatively small projects, shown in video format, with follow-up videos so donors can see exactly what their money accomplished.
Switching from a general “please donate to help us” to dozens and dozens of individual projects, figuring out the best way to create compelling but short videos, and doing timely follow-ups around time differences, and power and internet outages — not to mention just learning a whole new platform’s algorithms and rules — was a pretty steep learning curve.
BUT
We did it! It helps that I’m really stubborn and a natural problem solver. It also helps that DonorSee is extraordinarily responsive to our questions and suggestions, as well as committed to our success.
And now we’re in the Spotlight! You can click the button below to see my interview and hopefully get a broader overview of our work, our challenges, and our dreams.
We’ve raised over $11,000 on DonorSee in 5 1/2 months, and we’re very excited to see where 2022 takes us!
DonorSee listened, and their newest update means more of your money to our programs!
We have loved being on DonorSee, and have had over $8,000 in donations through the platform since September. It has allowed us to quickly respond to urgent needs as well as fund supplies for our students, a daycare, and more.
But the most common feedback from YOU was that 17% of your donation went to DonorSee, 3% to credit card fees, and only 80% to us directly. While your donations also helped us get traction with donors directly on the DonorSee platform at a 3-4 ratio, it was still a basic-math sticking point for a lot of you.
Well, DonorSee listened! This year, they started a Premium Membership for a limited number of partners, and we were invited! Now we pay a flat fee per month — $30 for the first 3 months and $100 after that — and all your donation comes to us (minus card processing). Since we “spent” $1303 on the 17% fee in just 4 months in 2021, this is a BIG deal for us!
With Term 1 of 2022 Skills for Life starting this week, several medical needs, and more up right now, we hope you’ll check it out and donate today! Every dollar counts, and goes to the programs.
Baby Liz received second degree burns this weekend after swatting a bowl of hot porridge out of mom Jenifer’s hand and onto herself. She was rushed to Nsambya Children’s Hospital where she is receiving daily treatment. She’s doing very well! We have a project up for her medical bill, if you’d like to help!
UPDATE: Liz was treated successfully and is fully healed! We are so grateful to our donors on DonorSee who gave to her medical bills!
