St Lawrence Home of Hope Lusaka – Project Update
St. Lawrence Home of Hope Foundation in Lusaka is an emergency placement childcare facility dedicated to helping vulnerable children and their families. They have recently published their third newsletter (May 2023) which is below.
DEAR FRIENDS
Greetings from Lusaka, and welcome to Home of Hope’s third newsletter!
Rising to meet ever greater demand
Only five months into this year, 46 new boys have come to Home of Hope off the streets, and we are on track to exceed last year’s record of 120 boys in our care. Our classrooms and dorms are bursting at the seams.
When a new child arrives, as so many have in recent weeks, we see two people in front of us: the scared, hungry, traumatized boy he is now, and the trustworthy, competent, kind person we know he can become – because we have seen it happen, again and again.
We have seen that with love, patience, and support, scared little boys can become young men like Mishek, who is thriving with Home of Hope, excelling in his studies, and earning top marks in school. This year Mishek passed his Grade 12 exams with distinction in all subjects, earning himself a spot at the university. As he looks ahead, Mishek wants to become a physician. We couldn’t be more proud.
Education in Zambia is expensive, Mishek’s parents have disabilities that prevent them from earning much income, and Home of Hope’s capacity to support post-secondary education is limited. So, Home of Hope will do what we can to contribute to Mishek’s school fees and help the boy chart a path through school that might include periods of study, followed by periods of employment and careful saving.
Creating a pathway to education for traumatized children
At Home of Hope, we know that our children won’t be successful in school if they come right off the streets and into regular classrooms. That is not due to a lack of motivation. If you ask children on the street what they want for themselves, most will say they want an education, and the chance to go to school is often what draws them to come to Home of Hope. But our children tend to be far behind, and face emotional and behavioral challenges that make being in a classroom difficult. They struggle to concentrate and are labeled as underperforming, which reinforces the negative self-image many boys already carry.
So at Home of Hope, we start a child’s education in-house, with a caring teacher who is trained in trauma and understands the issues our kids are facing. Our teacher works with students in small groups or even one-on-one for an hour at a time, followed by breaks. Over the course of a year, most children are able to catch up to their peers and successfully enter a regular school.
Other children are reunited with families that cannot afford to pay even modest school fees. In such cases, we ask parents to do what they can to support their child’s education – even if it is only to buy pencils – and Home of Hope covers the remainder of the costs of schooling.
These days, Home of Hope is working smarter
To keep up with the growing number of children who come to Home of Hope, we have had to find ways to work smarter. Our upgraded financial management system and an Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool called ChatGPT are helping us keep our heads above water. Our improved financial system allows us to track our expenses and contributions more accurately and efficiently – ensuring that every contribution we receive is managed responsibly. We are using ChatGPT to submit letters to Zambia’s social welfare agency much more efficiently, and to make meaning out of the data we track on our boys. With the help of AI to analyze our data, we can quickly investigate questions like:
When are our children most likely to run away? What factors are associated with a successful reunion of a child with his family? We are compelled by our circumstances to strive for greater efficiency, and inspired by our commitment to our mission to strive for greater impact.
Your support makes this work possible…
It is only with your support that we can do these things – pay primary school fees and teacher salaries, help out with the cost of university for a star student, and feed our growing number of children every day. Right now, food is increasingly expensive, demands on our staff are at an all-time high, and we need your partnership in this work as never before. We hope you will continue to partner with us in this work.
One of the proverbs in Chewa says: 'Ciswe cimodzi siciumba culu'- 'One ant does not make an anthill'. Only with the help of others can we reach our goals.
We deeply appreciate all the gifts and donations we have received; we are immensely grateful and couldn't function without your support!
Br Jacek Rokowski M.Afr. Director Home of Hope
Home of Hope relies entirely on gifts and donations from well-wishers and friends to carry out their work. Further information can be found on their website