Abraham is one of a family of three brothers. His father died recently, leaving many hospital bills and his widow penniless. Despite having recently given birth, Abraham’s mother is forced to work during the day as a washer woman in order to gain money for food and basic essentials. She washes with the child perched on her back, often for many hours in the hot African sun.

Since this work is very poorly paid, she supplements this income by making “ tej ” in the evening which she sells direct to customers knocking at the door. Tej is a strong locally made beer and is commonly drunk by the less desirable members of society. As a result, Abraham and his brothers are exposed to drunk and violent visitors, causing them to live in constant fear. However, his mother feels that she has no choice but to continue this work, since her washing job does not provide enough money for the family to live on.

Abraham is a very shy and withdrawn child due to his personal circumstances and his mother is desperate to end this never ending cycle of poverty and disadvantage, believing that if Abraham is educated at English Alive then he will be able to eventually gain qualifications and thus obtain suitable employment.

What we are looking for :
1/. A scholarship for Abrahams schooling. School fees are currently £4.70 monthly, with an additional one off fee of £3.50 for school uniform and £2.25 for books.
2/.Funding for the family in order that Abrahams mother is able to stop her tej making job, ensuring that the family are able to live in safety. This would be approximately five pounds monthly.

Emmanuel’s mother first approached the school for assistance, since she had become aware of the schools reputation for providing assistance to struggling families. Through floods of tears she disclosed how she had not yet sent her child Emmanuel to school since she was unable to provide him with exercise books or decent clothes in order to attend the local government school. As a result, despite being seven and a half years old, Emmanuel had never received schooling of any kind. Indeed, he had not often left the house since he did not have clothes to wear.

English Alive Academy was touched by the mothers desperate plea, and subsequently decided to educate Emmanuel for free, as well as purchasing for Emmanuel three sets of second hand clothes as well as pencils, exercise books etc.

When Emmanuel joined the school he was a very introverted child, sitting in the corner of the nursery class and lacking the confidence to speak or interact with child or adult alike. In order to address this, we provided Emmanuel with individual tuition in the office, explaining the concept of letters and numbers and encouraging every little bit of progress. After three weeks, he had gained enough pencil control skill to join the reception class ( for pupils aged 4 – 5) where he is much happier. He has gained in social skills on a daily basis and through continual sustained effort of supplementary individual teaching, his academic ability is growing.

What we are looking for :
Since the school finds it difficult to cover expenses, we are looking for funding for Emmanuel’s school fees. These are currently£4.70 monthly, with an additional one off fee of £3.50 for school uniform and £2.25 for books.
In addition we are asking for funds to buy Emmanuel second hand shoes / clothes three times a year. The cost for this would be approximately £3, three times a year

 Gashaw has been attending the Nazareth school. During his time here we noticed a severe decline in both his dress, his lunchbox contents and his overall emotional state.

At the start of this academic year, Gashaw's mother was asked to talk to the school regarding the situation . Amidst floods of tears she disclosed that her husband had left her nine months previously for another woman, taking all the money and leaving her in desperate circumstances. She is a very proud woman and was unwilling to reveal her personal circumstances, attempting to hide their struggle for money.

Gashaw's mother has attempted to address this problem through gaining part time work as a cleaner, providing her with some income, however it is not enough for basic food and clothes for the family of six.


What we are looking for :
Since the situation has been explained, the school has admitted Gashaw for free. However, since the school finds it difficult to cover expenses, we are looking for funding for Gashaw’s school fees. These are currently £4.70  monthly, with an additional one off fee of £3.50 for school uniform and £2.25 for books.  Financial support for the family for basic clothing and foods is also requested – £4 monthly.

Hana’s mother came to the school since she had heard about our reputation of helping pupils in difficulties. Her husband had recently died from AIDS and she had recently discovered that both herself and her daughter Hana also had the HIV virus.
She is aware that her young daughter’s life is likely to be cut very short, thus is extremely keen for her daughter to have the best experience she can whilst she can. As such, she was very reluctant to send her daughter to the government school , with classes of over two hundred pupils , squashed seven to a desk and learning by merely repeating the teacher or copying in silence from the board. Instead, she wanted her daughter to experience playing with toys, learning in a safe environment and enabling her to forget about her situation and simply be a happy young child.
The school was touched by this situation and thus we are currently educating Hana free of charge.

What we are looking for :
We feel that this is the most urgent case that we are currently dealing with, since there is no knowing when the disease will become severe, both for Hana and her mother. As a result, we are looking for funding on three levels :

1/.Since the school finds it difficult to cover expenses, with all teachers working for a minimal wage etc. we are looking for funding for Hana’s school fees. These are currently £4.70 monthly, with an additional one off fee of  £3.50 for school uniform and £2.25 for books.

2/. The family are aware that it is currently inevitable that the HIV virus will develop into AIDS and there is a real concern regarding forthcoming medical expenses. It is not possible to estimate this cost, with any contributions being most welcome.

3/. Since the family have barely enough money for food, Hana has only one set of clothes and one pair of shoes – both of which are in a rapidly disintegrating state. As a result, we are looking for funding for the purchase of clothes and shoes on a regular basis. These could be purchased second hand at the cost of £3 for a set of clothes and shoes

Tsion is a girl who has Downs Syndrome. This is a condition which is not understood in Ethiopia and there are absolutely no facilities available for people with mental difficulties of any kind – either for children or for adults. Tsion is one of five children and her father died a few years ago. Her mother makes ends meet by working as a cleaner.

Tsions mother was extremely keen for her daughter to be educated, thus sent her to local schools from the age of six. Tsion struggled within the other schools that she attended , which have an emphasis on copy writing and repetition – both aspects of which Tsion has particular difficulties.
This struggle culminated with an eventual expulsion from the school, since she was unable to cope with the work and was now physically too big to be in a class with younger students.
She came to our school as a last chance – if we had refused her, then she would have ended her schooling barely being able to read or write.

Because Tsion’s previous schooling consisted of being ignored and sitting on her own in the corner, she lacked confidence and social skills. As a result, English Alive Academy employed a part time teacher for Tsion, who helps her in the mornings.
This teacher has made an enormous difference to Tsion's life – she is now confident and communicative, with the one to one teaching enabling her to develop her pencil control skills up to a level where she is able to participate in the class.

What we are looking for:
The school struggles to pay for the part time teacher, thus we would like to ask for funding for Tsion’s teacher, either on a part time or full time basis.
The cost would be £7 monthly for a part time teacher or £14 monthly for a full time teacher.

Our relationship with Kidest was originally as next door neighbour, where she lived in a small room with her husband. After a short while, we became aware that she was having difficulties with her husband, who appeared to be permanently sick, with all funds being used on hospital bills. Within a few weeks, the husband had died of AIDS and Kidest was left as a penniless widow.

Unfortunately, Kidest had no qualifications, thus was unable to gain employment after her husbands death, leaving her in very difficult circumstances, as she had no family to support her at this time. As a result of her tragic circumstances, English Alive Academy decided to give her employment as the school secretary, converting one classroom into a house for her, in order that she was able to save her wages to repay her late husbands hospital bills.

We have been fortunate in obtaining funding for Kidest to attend a six month computer course, thereby giving her a formal qualification, which she will be able to utilise in future employment. However, mid – way through the course, Kidest became sick and was diagnosed as HIV positive. Kidest has been able to complete the course and gain the qualification and is currently on medication to hold her sickness at bay.

What we are looking for :
We are looking for funding on two levels :
1/. For Kidest to attend a secretarial course. Since she is optimistic about her sickness and is determined to continue life as fully as possible, she wishes to enroll on a four-year secretarial diploma course which would run Monday to Friday two hours per evening. The cost would be £5 per month.

2/. For Kidest to finally pay off her deceased husbands outstanding hospital bills and to move out of the small converted classroom into more suitable housing. Current outstanding bills are £75 with the cost of basic housing being £15 monthly.