Iris Dakar has three main branches of ministry. The first two are our Iris Family (bringing abandoned and abused children into our foster families) and helping the street children. You can learn more about these in our previous news articles. The third branch is Iris Social. This is where we reach disadvantaged families in our community with aid and preventative measures in order for their children to stay in their biological families. We also call this Family Strengthening and the goal is to provide families with the resources they need to avoid placing their children into institutional care.
Every year our team has had the pleasure of helping such families in our community with a school supply distribution. This distribution helps keep the children in their proper families where they belong. In Senegal, the school year started the first week of October and we were able to provide school supplies to forty-five children in our community!
We started with the kid’s club that we do weekly in a neighboring village. We integrated the distribution into our usual program of songs, games, and an encouraging word. Twenty of the school-aged children that come to our club on a regular basis received a new backpack full of notebooks and other supplies they would need for the school year according to their grade. Approximately one hundred other children that were present for the distribution received a variety of miscellaneous supplies including notebooks, book covers, and chalk.
We then also conducted a distribution at our base for twenty-five other children in our village. In each child’s case, we were aware of their family’s specific need for support in their education. We welcomed them and then had a time of playing together and listened to an inspiring story by one of our team members that heads up this program. At the end, each child received their backpack full of supplies. For some of the students that are in even greater need, we also help cover their school fees for the year.
It was an honor to see the joy that they all had because of this blessing, and we are looking forward to being able to continue to follow-up with these students as they progress in their studies.