Isaac's House Newsletter - March 2018
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Isaac’s <strong>House</strong><br />
<strong>Newsletter</strong><br />
<strong>March</strong> <strong>2018</strong><br />
About Isaac’s <strong>House</strong><br />
As a small charity, we are extremely appreciative of our<br />
sponsors, donors and supporters. The success of Isaac’s<br />
<strong>House</strong> and the positive difference that has been made<br />
to the lives of the children we support in Uganda is<br />
wholly thanks to the passion, commitment and<br />
generosity of our supporters.<br />
Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> continues to be a personal charity with a<br />
vision to help vulnerable children in Uganda. We care<br />
for 19 children living at Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> children’s home in<br />
a safe, stable, family environment. Thanks to their<br />
sponsors the children have access to education and<br />
health care, and more importantly they have a place to<br />
call home. As a charity, we also support children in the<br />
community with their education, to give struggling<br />
families the opportunity to send their children to school<br />
and the chance for a bright future.<br />
With your support Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> are continuing to help<br />
in the community too; with various projects, business<br />
start-ups and family support.<br />
Latest News<br />
Education updates…<br />
We are delighted to inform you all that last month we received the results for Sam, Lawrence, Rachel, Julius and<br />
Bosco for the equivalent of their GCSE examinations. All of the children passed! The examinations were not easy,<br />
with only 9% of children in Uganda achieving a 1 st grade this time around, and sadly even 9% failed examinations<br />
altogether. We were thrilled all of our children passed their examinations as we know how hard they have been<br />
working over the past 4 years towards this how much these qualifications will help them with their future careers<br />
and chosen paths.<br />
We would like to thank our supporters as Rachel, Julius and Bosco would not have had the opportunity to<br />
continue with their education and achieve their certificates without your donations. Sadly only 1 in 4 children in<br />
Uganda reach Secondary level due to the expensive school fees or not reaching the required grades at the end of<br />
Primary.<br />
We are extremely proud of Sam as he was amongst the 9% in the country to score a 1 st Grade and as a result is<br />
continuing onto his A-Levels and has chosen to study Sciences.<br />
Lawrence has chosen to study Building Construction,<br />
and is going to be attending Nakawa Vocational<br />
Training Institute in Kampla, this Insititue is set up in<br />
a similar manner to a university so he will get to<br />
experience a student’s life.<br />
We wish both boys the best of success in this next<br />
chapter and will keep you updated on their progress!
Our lovely Gloria who is studying Cambridge also received her IGCSE results and scored<br />
3 A’s, 1 B and 4 C’s. She was delighted with this result and in Uganda’s education system<br />
this is considered the highest grade. We are so proud of Gloria as she puts so much hard<br />
work and efforts into her academic studies. Gloria has always wanted to be a lawyer and<br />
still has this interest in the future, however over<br />
the school holidays, following work experience at<br />
an Medical Centre and helping with Medical<br />
Community Outreaches, she now wants to pursue<br />
a career in Nursing.<br />
Great news too for our Simon who excelled in his end of Primary<br />
examinations and scored such a brilliant grade he has now joined one of the<br />
top Secondary schools in Uganda! Well done Simon.<br />
Thank you from Florence…<br />
Thank you to everyone who kindly donated to support Florence. Florence sadly lost her husband when thieves<br />
broke into their family home and she too was badly injured, losing her arm. Florence wanted to be able to work<br />
and support her 4 children herself. With your donations and support we were able to help Florence finish<br />
constructing her new home, and set up a small business. Our lovely Pappa Charles took time out recently to go<br />
and visit Florence in her new home, in her village, around 3 hours away from Kampala. He was very happy for<br />
Florence and also extends his thanks to the charity for being able to help.<br />
2017 Review…<br />
Our lovely Jjajja…<br />
Our lovely Jjajja is retiring and moving back to her village. Jjajja is a wonderful<br />
lady, who we first met when we began helping educate her Granddaugher<br />
Livius. Jjajja became our Crafts teacher and grew a close bond with all our<br />
children. Sadly as she is getting older her eyesight and knees cause her pain<br />
and discomfort. Jjajja owns land in her village and has more support from her<br />
family there. She wants to be able to live a peaceful life and will be able to eat<br />
what she grows. Thank you to everyone who donated to help Jjajja with her<br />
retirement and all the lovely messages she received via Facebook. As a charity<br />
we are committeed to continuing to support Livius with her education and she<br />
will be visiting her lovely Grandmother during the school holidays.<br />
2017 was a brilliant year for Isaac’s <strong>House</strong>, and marks 10 years since Paul Howells first visited Uganda and where<br />
Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> all began.
2017 Review…<br />
In 2017 we had two volunteer trips to Uganda led by Paul himself, and a Weightmans staff trip in May thanks to<br />
organiser and trustee Hayley Gilroy. As a charity we really promote these trips as they allow our supporters to see<br />
for themselves the good work of the charity and what a beautiful country Uganda is, along with meeting all the<br />
wonderful children and families we support.<br />
Thank you to everyone who attended our fundraising events in 2017; the Curry Night in Formby and Haloween<br />
Party in Liverpool. An incredible amount of money was raised and will help us continue our good work in the<br />
community and running Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> children’s home. All the children continue to be happy, healthy and making<br />
us so proud!<br />
Thank you from the children at Isaac’s <strong>House</strong>!<br />
As a small charity, we really appreciate those who organise fundraising or sponsorship events themselves. We<br />
understand the effort and time that goes into fundraising and we are so thankful to you all for choosing Isaac’s<br />
<strong>House</strong>.<br />
A huge well done and thank you too for Victoria Bell who swam Lake Windermere to help raise funds for our<br />
beautiful children and Victoria’s family and friends who sponsored. Victoria herself has never been to Uganda but<br />
still chose to support us and we hope knowing that 100% of the money she raised goes directly to helping the<br />
children we support helped make the swim all the more worthwhile.<br />
In 2017 we also began selling Christmas cards made by the children, this was a huge success and we hope to<br />
repeat again this year. Christmas in Uganda is very different to Christmas in the UK. With no snow, Santa, or<br />
presents, the day is focused on spending time with family, eating lots of food and attending Church. Our children at<br />
Helping in the Community<br />
As we have previously mentioned, education in Uganda is fee-paying. This causes many parents to be unable to<br />
send their children to school, or for children to have periods where they are out of education. The staff at Isaac’s<br />
<strong>House</strong> came up with a wonderful idea on another way to give back to the community and opened up James Dunn<br />
<strong>House</strong> of Hope in the afternoons to children who sadly are not currently in school. Thanks to our donators we have<br />
a good selection of books and education material, and with most of our children grown up the staff had some free<br />
time to sit with the children, reading and teaching. We understand this does not replace a good quality education,<br />
but we hope to at least be able to give the children some routine and keep their brains and minds active.<br />
When we first started last year we had a family of 5 siblings; their father worked on a stone quarry and had<br />
become badily injured and unable to work for 6 months, and therefore unable to pay school fees. However, we are<br />
deighted the children are now back in school, and did not need to re-sit the school year thanks to our help and<br />
support during this time. This is just one example of a family who have really benefited from this set up and we<br />
continue to help those in the community.<br />
This video show the children at the end of last year performing songs and dances to show their appreciation.
How £5 a month can make a difference….<br />
Did you make a resolution to give back this year? Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> can help you!<br />
Set up a monthly donation of £5 today to Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> via www.justgiving.com/isaacshouse.<br />
This is just £1.25 a week, which can be spent on a coffee in the UK but in Uganda can make such a difference…<br />
• £5 provides clean water into the children’s home for 7 days<br />
• £5 can feed a child with 3 healthy meals for 10 days<br />
• £5 purchases medicine to treat malaria<br />
Photo Moment<br />
Concy, Gloria and Ruth laughing away<br />
whilst Gift stays posing. We love this<br />
photograph of the girls at the beach,<br />
on the shores of Lake Victoria. It is so<br />
lovely to see how the 7 girls who live<br />
at Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> have become so close<br />
over the past 8 years and really see<br />
each other as sisters. They care and<br />
support each other, and bicker<br />
sometimes too! Their bonds will stay<br />
with them, long after they leave Isaac’s<br />
<strong>House</strong> and this is something we are<br />
really proud of and can also smile<br />
about.<br />
Please help!<br />
When Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> began, we received so many donations and supporters but did not manage to collect all<br />
addresses. Anyone who supports Isaac’s <strong>House</strong> with monthly donations, regardless of the amount recieves our<br />
yearly calendar so please get in touch. We really want to be able to keep in touch with our supporters so if we<br />
don’t have your address or e-mail address, please get in touch to isaacs.house@hotmail.co.uk. This will also help us<br />
with reclaiming back Gift Aid (25% of all donations!).<br />
Website: www.isaacshouse.org<br />
E-mail: isaacs.house@hotmail.co.uk<br />
Facebook:<br />
www.facebook.com/isaacshousecharity<br />
UK Registered Charity: 1124542