Education

Girl in school_Ghana, a photo by Join Up! on Flickr.

When I think about meeting the needs of the children in Ghana the most important and influential immediate (physical and tangible...) need I can think of is Education! Sure all children need food and water and shelter and love. I absolutely think those things are primal needs for healthy lives. But what I am concerned with is changing a system that locks kids away from their childhoods. A system of work that enslaves children. If we can fight THAT system that is embedded in poverty then we will likely have well loved and well fed children. And the key to fighting a system that is intertwined with poverty is education. It is universal. That is how you fight it here in the US and how you fight it in Africa. 

When we go to Ghana in November, we will be working hard on bringing education to children. The idea is that these children are going to be the future business men and women of their nation. The future doctors and nurses and leaders. That is why building another school building at The Village of Life is of great importance! This will allow more children to be rescued off of the lake and given a formal education. An education that will allow them to employ moral business practices and to advocate for children as they turn into young men and women. 

We are also going to continue to work on educating the slave masters that own the sweet children on Lake Volta. Praying that peaceful attempts at educating these men and Gods movement in their lives will start to change the hearts and minds of the people who buy and use children in their fishing businesses. 

Please be a part of this! It is how we will help this region in Ghana change. It isn't a hand out at all... it is educating them and providing them with the skills necessary to go on to be honest and  moral business men and leaders in the future. Now that is a powerful goal! Please donate to the school if you can. Every single dollar will help. $30,000 is what it takes to  build this new school. That is nothing when you look at the school buildings our children go to in the US. NOTHING. We can do this. We can raise $30,000 to give beautiful children a family and education. We can raise that money to have a place for FORMER slave owners to take business classes or learn new skills so they can run an honest business that violates no ones rights. Get the word out. Donate whatever you can. If all of my friends donated just $10 we would be WELL on our way to building a new school in Kete-Krachi for rescued children. We would be WELL on our way to helping to transform a huge region of a country through empowering them and educating them. It is quite amazing when you think about it all. I truly believe that we can all take part of being the hands and feet of God in this. God has a heart for children and wants us to fight for their rights. I hope you can take part in this journey with us.

Books, books, books

oxfam-ghana-18, a photo by tobyadamson.co.uk on Flickr.

Education is freedom...

In addition to raising money to build a new school building at The Village of Life campus, we are collecting supplies for the kids/teachers who use this school. They can always use new resources! One of the bigger needs for the school and the children and staff are books. Curriculum that isn't outdated is a big need. Particularly curriculum and books about health and fitness. But all curricula would be appreciated. Math, science, art, literature, English, handwriting, music, geography. Also the kids really love books and are in need of story books and work books and just any learning material out there. They are hungry for knowledge.We need to feed that hunger! These are the kids who are going to transform their country. These are the kids who have a very good chance of putting child trafficking out of existence in Ghana and these are the kids we need to be investing fully in if our goal is to end human rights violations. So if you have children's books, chapter books, or curricula to donate, we would very much appreciate adding it to the pile we have started. I have a feeling I am going to be shipping several boxes of books and curricula ahead of us but if that is how it works out... FABULOUS!

soccer ball drive

soccer, a photo by belovedshoshanna on Flickr.

What reminds you of childhood? For me... it is undoubtedly the hours upon hours upon hours that I spent on the road beside our corner lot house playing basketball. Shooting hoops with the neighbors, my step-dad and brothers, my mom and grandma even played with us once... shooting hoops when I was happy, when I was sad, when I was frustrated. Practicing and practicing so I could make the high school basketball team. Shooting away the anxiety, shooting through the excitement as I waited for teenage life changes, shooting to raise money... I always had a basketball in my arms. I would work on shooting 3's for hours at a time. Then dribbling drills and layups and playing horse and whipping everyone in the neighborhood :P. Basketball was an absolute joy of my childhood. 


Most of us have those things from our childhood that really just remind us of being children. For many Ghanaian children, soccer/football, is that link to childhood. That thing they want to be awesome at and practice hard to learn. In so many of the videos and first hand accounts of child trafficking... I have heard child after child say "and when we can sneak it in, we play football". It is a passion, it is a connection to an otherwise childhoodless life. A soccer ball is an extremely coveted possession for these children. AND it is something that we can get for next to nothing and give to children in Ghana. 


So for the next month... until my oldest son starts kindergarten... I will be collected soccer balls to take with us to Ghana to give to children we meet there. You can donate money to my personal fund and denote that you are "sponsoring a soccer ball (or several)" or you can get with me and get my address and ship them right to me. The more we get, the more we can give. So with that being said, I am not opposed to deflating 50 or 100 soccer balls to ship ahead of us to Kete-Krachi so that we can inflate them all and distribute them to amazing, beautiful children. 

Slaves of the Lake

If you have some time, please watch this documentary. This is not the organization we will be working with but they do very similar things as George and PACODEP. This documentary tells the story of 2 boys who were sold into slavery by their families and who were rescued by a local organization. It is eye opening and tugs at my heart to see children suffer in this way. My prayer is that we bring awareness to the world about child trafficking and that people will be moved to act. If you are looking for ways to help, please let me know. JD, Tia and I have plenty of ways you can get involved with this trip!

my children and MY children

My children, in Ghana, are on my heart today. Working on a presentation for a talk I am giving at church in a few weeks is proving to be a tear filled event. Recognizing the difference between my children on Lake Volta (as they have become my heart and passion in so many ways) and MY children that I birthed makes me feel so utterly sad and angry. Because in my two sons I see childhood. I see joy and very few worries. I see giggles and hugs and kisses. I see enjoyment in a lick of ice cream or drink of tea. I see trust in their eyes that I will protect them or that Daddy will keep them safe. I see children who have no adult responsibilities... as it should be. They are CHILDREN.

For a long time I set out to give my children the childhood I never had. I mean I guess I still want that. But as we get closer to meeting our children in Ghana. That becomes less of the focus. Less me and more others. The life my boys have... it is the life all children should have the opportunity to have. They should ALL have a family and education. They should all have a safe place to sleep at night and plenty of food, time to play and be fun, goofy little people. They should have children's responsibilities like learning to read and write and learning manners and that actions have consequences... but not the consequences of disobeying your slave master or having to dive to the bottom of a lake to untangle nets at 4 years old without the knowledge of how to swim. Those are big nasty consequences no person should know let alone children who have absolutely no control of the situation. And I get angry and frustrated for my children. I get angry that so many children don't know childhood. That so many children are forced to grow up without a family and home. That so many kids have no advocate. And it motivates me. Now I am their advocate. They have made an impression on me I can never shake. And I want them all to be like my children. I want them all to be in a loving home with loving people around them being educated and playing soccer and having access to good medical care. I want them to grow up with the tools to succeed and make an impact on the world.

And all of that makes me know my heart is going in the right direction. Because I really really want this face:

to look like these faces:

The good news is that they CAN! With your help, more and more of these children will be rescued from slavery and placed into loving homes. Homes where they get an education, food, medical attention, protection and most of all... a family. That is what The Village of Life is all about!

Photo Credit

If you can, please consider donating to the school fund or my travel fund. You can make a very real difference in the lives of OUR children. The world is so much bigger than our own lives. And our impact can be so much greater than just our lives too. Make an impact on these beautiful children. Because we are not just responsible for our children when we get right down to it. Our world is a community and God commands us to take care of all of the orphaned children.

Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world. James 1:27

Update!

So far I have collected about $850 of the auction funds! Today I deposited half of that into The Village of Life School Fund! I am so blessed and excited to be a part of this and humbled by how my friends are stepping up to help us raise funds for our trip and to build this school. It is a testament to how God can use ALL of us for this trip. Keep praying, keep finding ways to be involved and know that I appreciate and love you all.

Quick Recap of Auction

Hi! Just wanted my bloggie friends to have a quick recap of the auction.

It went very well! We raised about $1200... half of which will go to my personal travel expenses (and makes me about 300 shy of my plane ticket) and half will go to the school fund! Yea :)

If you bid and did not win OR you just want to make a donation, there are donation buttons on the right hand of this page. One for my travel fund and one for the school. If you want to split up your donation, you can deposit into my travel fund and leave a note via paypal and I will make sure half of it gets into the school fund.

Thank you all so much for your support. I will get back to my blogging ways soon. Today though, I am super busy with appointments and mailing loads of goodies to people and... you know that kind of stuff.

Take care!