Empowering young people in Kenya, Uganda, and Lesotho to fulfil their potential and initiate positive change in their communities.
How You Can Help
- Simply book your next holiday with Charitable Travel and tell us you want to support Rafiki Thabo Foundation. The charity will then benefit from the free donation you can make as part of the booking process. To read more about how this works, head to our ‘About US‘ page.
- If you want to make a donation to Rafiki Thabo Foundation and you are not booking a holiday, click here to visit their website.
- Visit rafiki-foundation.org.uk to sign up to newsletters, and follow the
Rafiki Thabo Foundation social media pages, and help spread the word.
How You Can Help
How You Can Help
- Simply book your next holiday with Charitable Travel and tell us you want to support Rafiki Thabo Foundation. The charity will then benefit from the free donation you can make as part of the booking process. To read more about how this works, head to our ‘About Us‘ page.
- If you want to make a donation to Rafiki Thabo Foundation and you are not booking a holiday, click here to visit their website.
- Visit rafiki-foundation.org.uk to sign up to newsletters, and follow the
Rafiki Thabo Foundation social media pages, and help spread the word.
- Simply book your next holiday with Charitable Travel and tell us you want to support Rafiki Thabo Foundation. The charity will then benefit from the free donation you can make as part of the booking process. To read more about how this works, head to our ‘About Us‘ page.
- If you want to make a donation to Rafiki Thabo Foundation and you are not booking a holiday, click here to visit their website.
- Visit rafiki-foundation.org.uk to sign up to newsletters, and follow the Rafiki Thabo Foundation social media pages, and help spread the word.
About Us
The Rafiki Thabo Foundation aims to improve the quality of life and increase the life opportunities for deprived members of our link communities by providing them with the means to continue with their secondary and higher education. We believe that a lack of hope and education is true poverty.
Our vision is that that young people, including those living with disabilities, will be empowered through education to fulfil their potential and initiate positive change in their communities. We do this by enabling access to education in Kenya, Uganda and Lesotho.
What we do
Our core programme provides grants to promising students (Rafiki scholars) who have each qualified and obtained a place at secondary or higher education, but who without our support would be unable to
afford the fees and instead would remain at home, labouring to help put food on the table or in the case of girls, be married off at a tender age for dowry. Education empowers and transforms the scholars’ lives, many becoming doctors, nurses, business leaders and community workers. It is imperative to our trustees to have full visibility of the financial support we provide. Rafiki Scholars apply and are selected by volunteer in-country committees, made up of community leaders known personally to the trustees. Fees are transferred directly to the educational institutions ensuring no money goes astray.
Education of course does not exist in a vacuum; at Rafiki Thabo we also support the development of school infrastructure and equipment, to further our aim to increase access to education. We also run an ‘Eat Well to Learn’ programme where 70 of the poorest students at our link school in Uganda are provided with a nutritious lunch each day, making it possible for them to continue in school. For most, this is the only meal they eat every day. Without this they would take on the long and hazardous walk to and from school every day, and be expected to concentrate and learn, on an empty stomach.
We nurture a relationship, not dependency, we aim to inspire our scholars to help others in their communities and encourage participation in our in-country alumni networks. When Scholars graduate and are able, they reach out and support the next generation either financially or through mentoring. We also aspire to educate our developed world audience and supporter base about Africa and the development issues it faces and build networks between our supporters, beneficiaries, international development practitioners and other partners.
“My parents both died and there was no one else to pay my tuition fees. Then, my dream came true: Rafiki Thabo agreed to support me. Now I am sure that I will finally achieve my dream of becoming a capacity builder and change many people’s lives in my community. Thank you, Rafiki Thabo Foundation: may you continue to change the lives of people like me”
‘If all women in low and lower-middle income countries completed secondary education, the under-5 mortality rate would fall by 49% — an annual saving of 3 million lives.’ (UNESCO/EFA, 2014)
‘Girls with secondary education are likely to marry 4 years later, less likely to die in childbirth, likely to have 2.2 fewer children, more likely to have healthier children and more likely to send their children to school’ (UNESCO, 2014).
Get in touch
Rafiki Thabo Foundation, 10 The Grange, Kingham, Chipping Norton, OX7 6XY
Rafiki Thabo Foundation is a registered charity in England and Wales (no 1193124)
by net effect