In July, a woman with Bluffton connections, Julie Hostetler Graber, will travel to Kenya to share her teaching experience with the staff of the Mathare Menno Kids Academy.

The Academy is a nursery through eighth grade school located in Mathare, a poverty-stricken area of Nairobi, Kenya, East Africa.

Julie was born while her parents, Don and Joyce Hostetler of Bluffton, were serving as volunteers in neighboring Tanzania. She has developed a lasting interest in the children there. This will be her third visit to Africa as an adult.

As an experienced teacher on a visit three years ago, she was appalled by the lack of educational supplies, books, and even food available for the 430 children who attend the little school held on the church grounds.

Her fifth grade classes in Dallas, Oregon, sponsored pancake breakfasts and yard sales and contacted community members for donations. Other friends made a quilt and auctioned it to raise funds.

Enough money has been raised to build two new classroom buildings and provide sports equipment, food and educational supplies.

Presently women of First Mennonite Church in Bluffton are collecting more school supplies, books and money to sent with Julie on this trip.

To buy a set of Swahili textbooks for the school, $600 is needed. Other funds will be used to buy appropriate reading material locally. A dentist from Salem, Oregon, will also go to provide dental care to the staff, the children and their families.

Earlier this month, several women in Bluffton gathered to knot a comforter to send as a gift to Pastor Caleb Owuonda of the Mathare Mennonite Church and his family. They also sorted the school supplies and books that have been gathered.

Additional equipment and funds may be donated at the church through June 18. After June 18, support can be given for this school and others through Mennonite Central Committee's Global Family Program.

~aEUREUR