Littleton High School began its annual gift drive to Musana, an orphanage in Uganda, on December 1st this event will go through the 17th which is during the week of finals. Supporting and funding Musana has been a tradition at LHS since 2009, all students are encouraged to participate in the Giving Snowman event by purchasing a small gift for the children back in Uganda.
t’s a great way to spread the holiday spirit and do something kind for someone else. If you or your friend decide to buy a gift make sure to visit the “Giving Snowman” which is posted in front of the cafeteria. On the snowman, there are snowflakes that provide general information about the orphans like age and gender. “The snowflakes have the age of an orphan, a suggested gift, and the gender, that way when you go buy a gift you have an idea of what they want.” said Prestel.
In addition to this, Littleton High School will sell gifts made in Uganda by women’s groups during the first or second weeks of February before Valentine’s Day.
“The women get microloans where they can make jewelry and bags which we can sell at LHS to help them pay the loan back. Once they pay off the loan the women then use these profits to help their village or make their own businesses,” said Kathy Prestel, the organizer of this collaboration.
The community organization Musana is tied to Littleton High School through three alumni, Andrea Pauline, Leah Pauline, and Sally Green, who traveled to Uganda for an internship while studying at CU Boulder. During their travels, the three of them witnessed the horrible conditions inside an eastern rural Ugandan orphanage which inspired them to establish Musana Children’s Home. The future founders were able to accomplish this by partnering with two community members from Uganda and adopting 80 of the 162 children found in the previous orphanage.
Musana Children’s Home was established in September 2008 and now has developed into multiple different institutions to help the surrounding community. Since 2008, the name of the organization has changed from Musana Children’s Home to Musana Community Development Organization (MCDO) and focuses on the needs of the surrounding community instead of just aiding orphans.
“They call Musana a community organization because they have so many things, they have the orphanage, a high school, a primary school, a health clinic, and women’s groups,” said Prestel.
Over the years Littleton High School has invited some of their employees to come to LHS and talk to students about the organization. The last time members of the organization were here was during International Week around 4 years ago.
“The students could actually learn first hand what Musana is all about. During the six or seven years prior students just heard it from me. But in the last four or five years, we’ve been able to bring people in from Musana to talk to everybody,” said Prestel.
If you’d like more opportunities to learn or aid Musana in its mission, you can visit their website and either donate or buy different items made by community groups by visiting the link below: