July 15, 2020
The schools in Wakiso have been silent for four months now. The rusted padlocks on the gates are starting to look permanent. But while the classrooms are empty, the minds of the children are still running—and right now, they are running on empty.
We met Musa last week during a follow-up visit to families who received our initial soap donations. In the noise and chaos of the slum path, where dozens of children were chasing an old tire, Musa was sitting alone on a jerrycan, tracing lines in the dirt with a stick.
He wasn’t drawing pictures. He was trying to remember his multiplication tables.
A Mind locked Down
Musa is ten years old. Before COVID-19 changed the world, he was at the top of his class in the local government school. His mother told us, with a mixture of pride and painful sadness, that Musa used to annoy her with questions. “Why is the sky blue? How does the radio catch voices from the air? Why do some people have cars and we do not?”
Now, Musa has stopped asking questions because there is nobody to answer them. His parents’ daily wage labor has dried up due to the lockdown; they are focused entirely on finding food for getting through today, not teaching for tomorrow.
When we sat with him, Musa showed us his greatest treasure: a tattered English textbook he rescued from a trash pile three weeks ago. It’s missing the first twenty pages. He has read the remaining pages five times.
“Musa is like a high-performance engine that has been turned off and left out in the rain. Every day that passes, a little bit more of his potential rusts away.”
The Danger of the “Gap”
Musa’s story is the story of thousands of children right now in Uganda. The global narrative is about “when schools reopen.” But the reality on the ground is that for children in extreme poverty, when the habit of schooling is broken, it often never returns.
The longer Musa sits on that jerrycan, the higher the risk that he will be pulled into child labor to help his family eat. The longer his mind sits idle, the harder it will be to restart it.
We are terrified of a “lost generation” here in Wakiso—children who were on the path out of poverty, but were knocked off by this crisis and may never find their way back.
Why Musa Inspires Us
We left Musa’s home with heavy hearts, but also with renewed fire. Musa hasn’t given up. He is still clutching that torn textbook. He is waiting for someone to unlock the gate.
Fecane Child Foundation exists for Musa. We cannot open the government schools today, but we refuse to let his mind atrophy. His resilience is our motivation to speed up our plans for community-based learning support and mentorship. We have to fill this gap before it becomes a chasm.
Musa is ready. His mind is open. He just needs the tools.
We are rushing to develop home-learning kits (pencils, exercise books, and reading materials) to keep these brilliant minds active during the lockdown. Just $15 provides a full kit for a child like Musa. Will you sponsor his supplies today? Send a Home-Learning Kit to Musa
