Faith, left, got pregnant during Uganda’s severe pandemic lockdowns, like so many teen girls who were struggling to survive. She was 14.
Her family were unemployed and unable to care for her. Ten Eighteen got her into Wamukisa’s program for pregnant girls, where she gave birth to Diana, but they can’t keep girls after childbirth.
She went to live with her mother who, while unable to care for Faith and Diana herself, was able to bring her back to Touch the Slum and the Ross House.
Diana is now learning hairdressing and looking forward to a sustainable future.
PS It costs $50 a month to feed, clothe, house, and educate the residential girls (and their children) in our program. By making a one-time donation or becoming a monthly donor today, you ensure girls like Faith are safe as they work towards their future!
2023 has been a banner year for Ten Eighteen, at Touch the Slum and in the west where we provided the well for Rwakobo Village.
Over a hundred girls have learned to read, write, speak English, and do basic math.
They have learned a skill in Tailoring, Hairdressing, Photography/Videography, or Digital Literacy.
We were selected by Plan International to be one of only two nonprofits in their referral program in the entire (LARGE) district, made up of millions of Ugandans.
We introduced drawing and painting and unleashed creativity in both students and staff — NOT something that’s very common in Uganda!
Every day, girls were rescued, supported, treated, respected, and lifted up, in ways big and small.
And guess what? 2024 is going to be even better!
January marks our 15th year working in the Namuwongo slum and in Uganda!
Also in January, we are taking a team of four amazing women who will bring lifetimes of skills in art, writing, cooking, organic farming, nursing and public health, and psychiatric social work to our staff and students.
In the spring, our “community organization” status will be officially upgraded to a country-wide NGO.
With the funding of our newest large project on DonorSee, we will be able to move the residential girls to a separate nearby house. This will give them more peace and quiet and room to heal, and it will free up space in the Touch the Slum compound to expand our vocational skills program.
As our farm continues to produce, we will start taking teams of girls from TTS who are interested in learning farming skills to get hands on experience. (You can’t grow much in the slum!)
All this and more is thanks to generous donations like the one you made last year. Will you consider making a year end donation to help us again?
As always, 100% of your donations go to the program, and we SO appreciate your support and encouragement!
PS If you aren’t following us on Instagram, now is a great time to start. Our home-grown media team does amazing work, and we have new content up every day. It’s a great way to keep up with all we’re doing in Namuwongo and to see all the fun we have on the team trip next month.
15-year-old Justine moved to the Namuwongo slum to live with her father. Unfortunately, her stepmother was abusive from the start, beating her and eventually throwing her out. The father did not intervene, so Touch the Slum was granted custody of her.
Now living in our dorm, Justine is doing great!
This is her story.
Blessings,
Jennings
PS $50 pays for a month for a girl in our residential program. All of her needs are covered, from clothing and food to medical care and vocational training. Your gift today will keep girls like Justine safe and in the program!
Brenda is 16 years old and has lived at the Ross House for a little over a year with her son Elijah. She lived with her mother, who is a vendor in the market, when she became pregnant.
A week after giving birth, her mother kicked her out in the middle of the night, but fortunately a neighbor brought her to Touch the Slum.
PS Emergency admissions and residential girls like Brenda cost us $50 a month to care for. Please donate today to help us care for the eight teen moms and their babies who are in residence! 100% of your donation goes to the program. Mwebele nnyo!
This week we welcomed 17-year-old Alice and her newborn baby (no name as yet!) into our residential program as emergency admissions. Alice had been given her final eviction notice by her landlord, who didn’t care a bit that she’d just had a c-section.
Earlier this year, Alice fled the conflict in the Congo because a Congolese man living in Uganda told her he could get her a job as a housemaid. She made her way to him in Namuwongo, where — surprise! — there was no job. Instead, he kept her with him, abused her, and got her pregnant.
A week before she delivered, he left to go shopping and never returned.
Alice doesn’t speak any local languages, and had to make her own way to the public hospital when she went into labor. There, she delivered by c-section and was released the next day. She took herself home, where there was no money or food.
After a week, she reached out to a lady who had helped her with food a couple of times. The lady is a women’s leader in the community and knows about our work at Touch the Slum. Fortunately, she called the office right away to let the staff know she was bringing Alice to the compound.
After the interview, Sarah returned to Alice’s home to pack up her meager belongings before the landlord returned to kick her out. She’s now settled into the Ross House, and the baby is being treated for malaria by Nurse Brenda. With food and clean water, Alice is able to nurse again, and they are resting and recovering.
This is, unfortunately, an all too common story.
Teen girls are at the bottom of the social ladder, used, abused, disposable once they get pregnant. Thousands of babies are unclaimed by a father, and there is no governmental or societal pressure to provide for them.
But thanks to YOU and your support, we had room to bring Alice and the baby in. We can feed her, give them clean clothes, provide diapers for the baby, give them medical care, and Mama Santa can teach her to care for her newborn.
You are (truly!) lifesavers, and we can’t thank you enough.
Mwebele nnyo,
Jennings
PS We have a project up to fund the cost of Alice’s entry package, which included a mattress and bedding, clothes, and personal supplies, as well as things for the baby. If you’d like to contribute, just click below!
After her father passed away, Harriet moved to the Namuwongo slum to live with her mother in a teeny tiny home. Her mother didn’t make enough to meet their basic needs, so Harriet “got a boyfriend” who could help provide some of the necessities of life, such as food and sanitary pads.
After she found out she was pregnant, the boy fled. Our social worker Sarah found Harriet in a squalid, bedbug infested, teeny tiny home with a one-week old baby who wasn’t thriving.
Harriet and the baby moved into the Ross House, and she moved through Literacy, Basic, and Advanced Tailoring. She is now running her own small tailoring business in the family’s home village.
This is her story.
It’s your support and encouragement that keep Touch the Slum open and providing such critical care and services to vulnerable teen girls in the slum. We so appreciate all you do for Ten Eighteen and Touch the Slum!
Mwebele Nnyo!
Jennings
PS Just $35 pays for a month for a teen girl at Touch the Slum! 100% of your donation goes to the program, always. To give today, just click the button!
I wanted to send this off-cycle announcement because it’s so exciting!
We have a new large project on DonorSee:
We are going to move our 12 residential girls to a new compound, just for them!
We opened the Ross House first, in October 2020, for teen moms in crisis. Since then we have added 2 more residential dorms, five skills, and have over 100 people in the small compound every day. It’s fun, loud, chaotic, and wonderful… but it makes it difficult for the residents to find any quiet time or splace, especially when they first come to us and are in crisis.
The project is $11,500 and will pay for the house, staff (Mama Santa and a security guard), utilities, food, furniture (living and kitchen), and everything else we’ll need for ONE YEAR.
We already have 10% funded — we’d love you to check out the video! Just click the button below.
I don’t know about you, but when I go shopping for clothes, I browse, scrutinize, reject, make piles, sort, try on… it’s exhausting! (And let’s not get started on bathing suit season…!)
Did you ever stop in the middle of TJMaxx and think, “Wow, this is quite a luxury?” Yeah, me neither.
When girls who join our residential program get to the point where they are in crisis and come to us, they have nothing but the clothes on their backs. And those are almost always infested with bed bugs, so into the fire barrel they go.
From Day 1, they have to rely on us for literally everything from a toothbrush to shoes to sanitary pads to clothes for their children. Choice, as a concept, is pretty limited — but that’s true for everyone living in the Namuwongo slum.
Donations have been slower this year, and inflation and wars make people justifiably afraid. Some of our larger projects, like clothing for the babies, have been slow to fund.
But YOU!
As you always do, you came through with much-needed clothes for our babies yesterday (hence the belated newsletter). And let me tell you how they shop:
Call a vendor on the phone.
Tell them we have a dozen babies and toddlers who need clothes.
Wait a few hours.
Receive a (literal) vacuum sealed brick of clothing in a tightly wrapped bundle.
Team up with friends to even lift it off the boda and carry it inside.
Carefully cut open the clothes from the UK and see what surprises wait inside. (You can watch the video on our Instagram page!)
It was like an early Christmas, and the clothing spread out everywhere gave the girls plenty of choice for their little ones. We also have some put aside for later needs.
Not every “win” is an exciting gotcha moment, but for girls who have learned to expect nothing from life, what you provide by supporting their basic needs as well as their education is HOPE. In humanity, in their futures, and for their children.
There is nothing else more valuable.
Mwebele nnyo,
Jennings
PS We’ve got some new projects up on DonorSee, like providing a Thanksgiving dinner for the girls in the residential program, November’s diapers for the 20 teen moms in Skills for Life, and more art supplies for the Literacy program. We’ve raised over $116,000 on the platform thanks to you!!
Sylvia is a 16-year-old mom of one son who lives at the Ross House. She came to us when she was four months pregnant and homeless. She’s worked very hard to become literate over the past 6 months, and will be learning a vocational skill in Skill for Life starting next term.
“I am smart” is not something she ever thought.
She’d never been to school. She’d never been cherished or complimented or taken care of.
But now, that was the sign she chose. We had others for International Women’s Day: I am Brave. I am Powerful. I am Worthy. I am Strong. The girls got to pick the one they wanted to have in their photo.
Sylvia chose I am Smart to describe herself, and that makes me incredibly proud (and a bit teary-eyed!).
For International Women’s Day (which is today as I’m writing, yesterday when you’re reading), I hope you’ll take a minute to check out our Instagram page (link at the bottom) and see the videos of these amazing young women taking charge of their own lives, determining their own destiny, claiming their own strengths.
Teen girls in Uganda are at the bottom of the social ladder, but slowly by slowly (mpolo mpola) we are changing that culture.
THANK YOU for making it possible!
Blessings,
Jennings
PS We launched the ecobrick water tank project on DonorSee last week and just need $130 to get to 10% so it can be visible to the entire DonorSee audience. We’d love your help – just click below!
In early April 2022 we had a referral of a teen girl who was four months pregnant and homeless. (We’ll call her Angela.) Unfortunately, we had no available beds to bring her into Touch the Slum, but we were able to refer her to another program called Wamukisa.
Angela lived at Wamukisa while she was pregnant, and gave birth at Amani, who offers free childbirth to low-risk teen girls.
Unfortunately, Wamukisa doesn’t keep girls once they’ve given birth, and Amani only keeps them for labor, delivery, and a short recovery period.
That left Angela homeless once again, and she’s spent the last 6 months bouncing around between friends and evictions.
Unfortunately, this is commonplace.
Angela is homeless now and came to the compound today. Fortunately, we have a bed this time and are arranging for an at least temporary stay as we work out if she has any family she can return to.
Girls like Angela face a huge amount of fear and uncertainty. They have not been to school and have little or no family (Uganda has a huge population of orphans and the youngest population in the world, with 65% under 18). This leaves them open to exploitation and abuse, disease, and potential death on the street.
While we don’t know yet if Angela will stay with us, we try to minimize the stress and anxiety of a life of homelessness for our girls. Our residents are with us an average of a year, and don’t move out until they have the skills necessary to earn an income they can live on. They have access to Touch the Slum forever – the clinic, the daycare, even dropping by for lunch.
They have a safe place to call home, and a safe community in which to thrive.
I’ll keep you posted on Angela’s story – you are the reason girls like Angela can have a safe place to come for help, whether during an emergency or for a year.
Webele nyo!
Jennings
PS You can help us help girls like Angela by becoming a monthly donor today! Just click the button – it’s quick and easy.
