A group of Mount Forest and area residents is travelling to Africa later this summer as a part of a Free the Children (FTC) trip.
FTC is an international charity and youth empowerment movement founded in 1995 by human rights advocates Craig and Marc Kielburger.
In 2014, signs were erected at the entrances to Mount Forest proclaiming the community a “Free the Children Community, Special Friend to Osenetoi, Kenya” after community residents and school children raised $58,000 for a water system and school in the African community.
For Donna McFarlane, her husband Bob, and Barb Cowen this summer’s trip will be a return FTC trip to Africa.
McFarlane first got involved with the Me to We program while she was a teacher at Victoria Cross Public School in Mount Forest.
Me to We “challenges young people to identify local and global issues that spark their passion and then empowers them with tools to take action,” according to the website.
McFarlane started a Me to We club at the school and before long students had earned tickets to We Day, an event that “combines a live concert with inspiring stories of extraordinary leadership and change (with) world-renowned speakers and award-winning performers.”
Among the speakers that stand out in McFarlane’s mind were the Kielburger brothers, Eli Wiesel, Martin Luther King III and Romeo Dallaire.
McFarlane paraphrases a quote from Dallaire, who said that “no student should graduate from high school, college, university without a pair of muddy books under the bed and that mud should be from a Third World Country.”
McFarlane said, “I needed something to be passionate about when I retired and I had always wanted to get the three (Mount Forest schools) together when it came to Free the Children.
“So I invited teachers from all three schools to a wine and cheese party.”
Barb Cowen immediately came on board, as did a former teacher at St. Mary’s. Fundraisers ensued and as a result, Mount Forest adopted a school in Osenetoi.
The three Mount Forest schools – Victoria Cross Public School where Donna taught, Wellington Heights Secondary School where Barb Cowen is still a teacher and St. Mary’s Catholic School – and the community raised over $25,000 in order to adopt the school.
FTC used the money to implement education, clean water and sanitation, health and alternative income programs.
FTC facilitators and Maasi warrior guides joined the group of Mount Forest residents who went to the Maasai Mara in Kenya in July 2011 for hikes, school and community visits, and safaris.
They helped build a classroom at the first all-girls high school in Osenetoi, a community they discovered was desperately in need of a well and clean water.
“We didn’t realize what people were drinking for water until we were there,” McFarlane said. “And how bad it truly was. Our priorities changed because we knew the kids wouldn’t be getting an education, they would be dying due to a lack of clean water.”
Since then, money raised in Mount Forest was earmarked for a well, and it was finally drilled in 2013.
On that trip the group also visited the Bogani Duka, a Me to We Artisans Gift Shop where local handicrafts made by the Maasai mamas, including traditional beaded jewelry, honey, tea and wood carvings, are sold as part of FTC alternate income projects to ensure an increased income for families.
The 18 people travelling to Africa this summer are taking mounds of donated fabric and sewing supplies, including needles, bobbins, zippers and pins, as well as a dozen sewing machines, both refurbished and new. The group is also taking transformers so the sewing machines will work with the electrical system in Kenya.
Money to purchase and refurbish the sewing machines as well as the fabric and notions have been generously donated. Some group members will help the Maasai mamas learn to sew and that may well become an alternative income source.
Other members of the group, including McFarlane’s husband Bob and two other dentists, will provide dental care. Those with a construction background will help with projects underway while they are there. Teachers, including Cowen and three others from Wellington Heights, will work with the children.
“I decided five years ago that I wanted to go back,” McFarlane says. “Barb and I really want to go and talk to a couple of Maasai mamas at Osenetoi, to see what’s changed since the first trip and to see what they still need.
“The well has made a huge difference in people’s lives; girls can now go to school instead of having to walk miles to get clean water.”
Both women are also excited to introduce their fellow Mount Forest and area residents to Kenya and the FTC programs underway there.
“That just shows how a small town can make huge changes in people’s lives,” Cowen says.
