Pay It Forward Student Sponsorships
Just as with all of our projects, the Pay It Forward (PIF) Student Sponsorhip Program began as a grassroots response to an urgent need within our community of widows.
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Our project team conducts regular poverty assessments with members of the BWA via home visits. When doing these poverty assessments, a significant challenge that comes up time and time again for different members is the cost of school fees. Once widowed, the women in our community become solely responsible for covering school fees for their children, which are due each year and increase with each grade. Often, the women also become responsible for covering, or contributing to, their grandchildren's fees as well. For many widow households, the school fees alone are a barrier for their children to attend school at all, as most schools will not allow students to register without the full fee. However, it is not only the school fees themselves which are prohibitive as attending school requires other costs such as uniforms, boarding fees, textbooks and more.
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Our PIF Student Sponsorship Program addressed this challenge for widow's in our community by matching BWA member's children with a sponsor in Canada. The sponsors - ranging individuals to groups such as The Legacy Corporation - were asked to cover the termly school fees, as well as uniform and book costs for the student. Many of these students (including some highlighted below) were sponsored all the way through their secondary level of school.
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The PIF Student Sponsorship program is unique and has continue to evolve over the years.​​​​
"I am glad and proud to have been chosen through Uganda Partnership Association, I have got a life changing opportunity through education and some other support. I believe I have learnt a lot to share with the community.
Through education and widows support UP is not only conquering the fear of our society but also poverty one family at a time!"
Peter Ariho, Health Worker & Former PIF Student
Paying It Forward
What sets our PIF Student Sponsorship program apart from others is the notion of paying it forward. To "pay it forward" means to express the gratitude for a kind deed that was done to you, by doing something kind for someone else. The idea is that kindness and good deeds will continue to happen, and people who need help will receive it, so long as those of us who have been the recipient of goodness continue to be gracious, generous, and pay it forward.
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As a condition of their sponsorship, students who have been sent to school through our PIF Student Sponsorships are expected to understand this concept. They are to recognize the opportunity they were given through the kindness of a stranger, and utilize this opportunity to do something good for others.
As you can see below from the professions of many of these students, they have taken this responsibility very seriously and many of them are paying it forward by continuing to contribute to UP and the Legacy Community Primary School. As teachers, nurses, agricultural workers and more, these PIF students continue to pay it forward every day!
Our PIF Students
Here are some of the students who were sponsored through the original iteration of the PIF Student Sponsorship program and who have since graduated to start their careers in various fields. Click to learn more about each student!
PIF Student Sponsorships Today
As the initial cohort of students made their way through school and it became harder to secure individual sponsors UP began to reconsider the model. While school fees were still being identified by BWA members as a major challenge to their livelihoods, we became concerned that we may not be able to find sponsors that could commit to sponsoring a child all the way through primary or secondary school. This would be extremely difficult for the student and the family.
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In alignment with our participatory philosophy, we could not abandon the idea of supporting school fees for our members since it had been identified so strongly as a need. With consultation from the BWA membership, we settled on a model where BWA members are able to send their children as day students to Legacy Community Primary School for a reduced fee. This model of sponsorship continues to this day, easing the burden of school fees on our members.
The Impact of COVID-19
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many families were struggling even more to afford the school fees necessary to send their students to school. The BWA Executive and Project Director identified various students who were within a couple of years of graduation. Through individual and group donations we have been able to cover these students school fees for the years they have remaining.
"I must thank everyone contributing to the success of Legacy Community Primary school and Uganda Partnership Association.
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I'm one of the beneficiaries of the project. This project is also a Legacy to us"
Orishaba Justus, Secondary Teacher/Businessman and former PIF student
