Make a Difference Now

My friend Theresa Grant is an amazing woman who experienced a meaningful spiritual transformation some 4-5 years ago and left her high-powered Silicon Valley job to move to Africa, where she eventually started and maintains her own nonprofit organization called Make a Difference Now (MAD). MAD currently does work in Zambia, India, and Tanzania. Theresa’s work in Tanzania includes collaborating with local partners to care for 22 orphans in an orphanage called “Kilimanjaro Kids Care”. Theresa is responsible for their education and she sends all 22 of the children to an excellent private school. She is considered their parent, and yes, she is required to go to Parent Days at the school to represent her brood.

In Tanzania all children are required to go to Primary School- even though many families are so poor they cannot afford to buy the school uniform for their children. At the end of Primary School students take an English test, and if they pass the test they are allowed to move on to Secondary School. Without going to Secondary School there is little chance of ever landing a job beyond manual labor—like working as a porter, hotel cleaner, cook, or farmer. And sadly, 20-30% of children pass the English test to get into Secondary School. After that only 5% of children graduate from Secondary School to go on to college or university.

So one of the key things Theresa asks volunteers to do when they come to Tanzania is to spend quite a bit of time reading books with the children so they can hear how Westerners pronounce things and to imitate them the best they can. And these kids LOVE to read. I would stand at the orphanage and call out “Who wants to read?” and at least 5 children would race to the library yelling “Me, Madame, me!” There was a line to read with the volunteers. These photos are of volunteers Josh and Vanessa reading with the children.










It definitely put a new spin on “Go, Dog, Go!” and “Curious George” for me to hear them read out loud with a Swahili accent.