Mission 2018 was a grand success and is now a part of Matanya’s Hope’s 13 year and growing history! Thank you all who sent donations, gifts and financial support. Our blog site: www.journeytohelpafrica.com and our Facebook posts bring so many beautiful stories of this year’s journey to life. Our students were visited and loved on. Plans were made for their futures. We are changing thousands of lives and together, you and I are lifting human beings from feelings of hopelessness and despair to lives filled with hope and a future.

From our porridge program (which feeds 2000+ students daily), to the 10,000 liter rainwater tanks which provide clean safe drinking water vs. polluted, bacteria ridden river water most are forced to drink, we are saving lives.

Today, Matanya’s Hope has 240+ students sponsored in boarding schools (and we just added another today!) including 49 university students who are marching to a much brighter employment future with their education. We have graduates in accounting, engineering, nursing, teaching, business, beauty, information technology, culinary arts, pharmacy and law. Together, we have accomplished all of that and more.

This year our appeal is different. Matanya’s Hope must strengthen our core funding so that we may continue to provide the lifesaving food, water, counseling and other extraordinary programs we have developed – all which bring hope to our kids.

While it is essential to maintain individual student sponsorships and their needs, the need for core financial support has turned critical. This funding supports: the shipping of much needed donations, mailings, and the maintenance and gas for our vehicle during the 3-month mission in Kenya. My time in Kenya is spent gaining new introspective and serving each of our students, visiting their communities, and dispersing the donations where they are needed most. Last year over 3.5 tons of donations were shipped for a little over $13,000. That is 7000 pounds shipped for less than $2.00 lb. Operation Christmas Child does a wonderful job delivering shoe boxes of gifts to needy children and they collect $9.00 for each box. That is 4 times the cost of our delivery method. We operate on two continents and incur related costs in maintaining our position with both Kenya and the United States governments.

As we have grown so has the work load. We have in the past depended solely on a volunteer board and a few volunteers who have done all the paper work of financing and accounting. Matanya’s Hope runs a very streamlined budget to cover necessities, but as our impact on the region expands so does our need to have to have someone oversee the legalities of our 990s and record keeping in a non-profit world. Barring a fully versed volunteer on the regulations of non-profits, I may from time to time need to outsource a few of our critical documents for professional mandate.

Each annual mission includes volunteer participants who pay their own way. In no way do core funds support our mission volunteers.

For our donors who specifically contribute to one of our other programs such as porridge or water tanks, thank you. We appeal to you to continue supporting our efforts by contributing to our core fund. Please help Matanya’s Hope maintain the services provided to so many in need. Our goal is to increase our core fund by $35,000; to operate effectively in the coming year. Thank you for your continued provision.

Simply put, we are asking that each of us who believe in the work Matanya’s Hope is doing to raise competent human beings out of the storms of life, donate to this need. Dig a little deeper and contribute to help Matanya’s Hope grow.

We are near the time of year when we all think of giving and I can’t imagine a better cause to help.

Michelle Stark
Board President
and Ann Thomson, Board V.P.