I want to share with you a small snippet of an article that was shared with me by one of my team mates. The article is titled “Education Crisis in Southern Sudan,” and it is written by Tim Brown who is a UNHCR Education Officer in Yei, Southern Sudan.
“John Garang spoke of his ambition to ensure universal primary education in south Sudan within six years. However, the legacy of 21 years of conflict and underfunding is daunting. Fewer than 200 of the 1,600 schools in southern Sudan have permanent buildings.
[i] Most classrooms have only a board and chalk. According to UNICEF just one in five children of primary school age is enrolled,
[ii] dropout rates are high – especially for girls – and only one schoolchild in eight continues past grade four. Half of the region’s teachers have received no professional training and most have themselves completed only about four years of primary education. According to the USAID-funded Sudan Basic Education Program,
[iii] a mere 2,500 children – in a region larger than most countries in the world and with a population estimated to be 7.5 million – complete primary school each year. Only 1% of girls complete primary education and only one schoolchild in four is a girl. The lack of female teachers – just 6% of the teaching force – reinforces this gender imbalance. Ninety per cent of women are estimated to be illiterate.”
[i] The south Sudan statistics quoted in this paragraph do not cover the garrison towns formerly controlled by Khartoum.
[ii] www.womenwarpeace.org/sudan/docs/baseline.pdf[iii] www.careusa.org/careswork/projects/SDN093.aspWhen I read this paragraph my heart breaks. To think that only 2,500 children in Southern Sudan finish only primary education, meaning the number for completing secondary education is even lower. The Lord tells us that “children are a gift” (Psalm 123:3) and that we are called to “train them up” (Prov. 22:6). If we train them through the Lord at a young age, the knowledge of Him and desires to live by glorifying the Lord in all we do will be engrained deep within. Even as I watch the children that I am surrounded by here in Bundibugyo, it is painful to think about their lack of a good education. They attend schools where the teachers do not show up, where they just sit in class and copy notes from a board, and where they are set up to fail. Sometimes Hope feels lost here, especially hope in Christ. I do believe that there are some teachers in this district who do care about the success of their students. The Lord has blessed Christ School with teachers that care. But these teachers are a rare gem.
Now, you may be asking yourself, why is Kim telling me all of this? I want to plead with you to partner and commit with me to pray BOLDLY for the education in East Africa, and more specifically in the rural areas of Uganda and in Southern Sudan. Pray that the Lord would provide permanent buildings for schools to meet. Pray for teachers who desire to see change and are willing to undergo any necessary training. Pray for more female teachers. Pray for people to care. Pray for more girls to be encouraged to go to school and make it to university. Pray for the Secondary students in levels 4 and 6 who take exams at the end of the school year, where passing is crucial for them to be promoted. Pray that the necessary funds would be provided for building projects and school resources and supplies. Pray that this number of 2,500 would increase rapidly and in a miraculous way. Pray that hope would be found in Christ. Pray that when changes do happen and numbers do increase that God would be given all the glory. Pray that people would see that this kind of change is not possible without the hands of our Father. The prayer needs could continue, so I just ask for bold prayers. I believe that prayer can move mountains and this is a big mountain to move. A mountain though, that is not too big for God.
World Harvest Mission continues praying, seeking, and trying to develop a vision for how they can assist with this education crisis. Christ School is an answer to that prayer in Bundibugyo. Another way the Lord has answered this prayer is by connecting our East Africa director to people and organizations who are starting to conduct teacher training seminars. Our East Africa director is partnering with some of these organizations to help put on a training seminar in Goli, Southern Sudan. This seminar will be taking place during the week of April 17-24. As soon as our team found out about this training, because of knowing my heart for improving education, they came to me and asked if I was interested in attending. Of course my immediate response was yes. I wasn’t sure though if it was going to be possible for me to go because of my commitments in Bundi. But the Lord is good and He is making it clear that He desires for me to attend. Please pray for my heart as I begin to prepare for this trip. I am not exactly sure what my role will be when I get there, but pray that I am willing to fill whatever role the Lord desires for me to fill.
I have been praying that God would provide an opportunity for me to visit Southern Sudan and that He would show me the desire that He has for me in that place. A huge reason why I decided to extend my time in Uganda is because of my growing desire for improving primary education. I stand in awe of how the Lord is already providing this opportunity to go to Guli and observe teachers who care about being trained on how to develop education. I would also like to travel, when time allows, to primary schools around Uganda. This would allow me to see what kind of programs are out there and which ones encourage and assist students in succeeding and thinking BIG. When I started the process of joining World Harvest and committing for two years to serve and teach in Bundibugyo, I never imagined that I would be given this desire.
As I was writing this, a song by Jeremy Camp came on called “Take a Little Time.” In the chorus he says:
“Take just a little time to give your hands. To see the world, and take just a little time to try and understand, That there is more going on than what these eyes can see.”
Later on he adds:
I know it all seems complicated, there is nothing more that could be stated. Now is the time to kneel, reaching out for what is real. Many times I’ve hesitated, how much I feel, my heart is aching now.”
So, please reach out for our real and true God, “take just a little time” to kneel, lift your hands, look to the Father, and pray BOLDLY for this education crisis.
For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkenss," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body.
