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Our Projects

Sponsorship

Over the years, we have attracted sponsorship to improve the life chances of over a thousand children. 

Your monthly sponsorship will support a child in desperate need. 

They will receive:

  • a 50kg bag of rice once a year for their family

  • school funds/fees where needed

  • 2 sets of school uniform

  • shoes

  • school bag

  • all school needs

  •  payment to receive exam results 

  • medical payments if needed and 

  • friendly assistance at times of emergency.

Sponsorship can support a child from nursery education right through to tertiary or career education.

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Adama - Gambian nursery teacher wearing a yellow HELPING charity t-shirt. She stands smiling in front of a blackboard.
Teaching

Generous sponsorship of our Gambian teachers, like Adama, and teaching assistants pays for teacher training and their on-going salaries.  This ensures good quality early years education in our nurseries.

 

Teachers train in Gambian colleges and from time to time, experienced volunteer teachers from other countries visit to share good practice.

If you would like to sponsor a child or a teacher, please go to our Ways to Help page.

Education

The Charity currently operates three nurseries, Osborne, Chamen and Chessay Ma Jaw. They are free to users. These comprise 2 classrooms, each accommodating 35 children and taught by a minimum of three teachers. Each nursery has its own designated, smoke-free kitchen, staffed by local people. 

Projects are currently in-hand to extend two of these nurseries by adding an additional classroom to each.

Two Gambian school children, a boy and a girl in green gingham school uniforms, seated look to camera. They have a green wall behind them and two apples lay beside the boy.

We:  

  • Maintain and extend our thriving nurseries in the poorest parts of The Gambia giving children a head start to make better progress when starting school at age 7.

  • Train teachers to offer the best quality nursery education. 

  • Provide free lunch and free uniform for each nursery child. 

  • Sponsor children for the cost of school uniform and school fees from age 7.

  • Sponsor teachers for our nurseries 

  • Sponsor children and young people from primary education through to tertiary and career education leading to fulfilling careers. 

Water

We:  

​Provide and maintain bore holes and wells to provide fresh drinking for whole communities in an arid area.

Boy washing his hands under an outdoor tap put in at Fass by HELPING Charity in The Gambia.
Jenoi well in The Gambia a successful project by HELPING charity. With a volunteer in the background of the picture.
Clean water provided for the clinic created by HELPING charity in The Gambia.
Food

We provide:

  • Smokeless kitchens in our nurseries, preventing early deaths from smoke inhalation and staffed by local women

  • Clean, safe, shady eating areas for nursery children to enjoy a nutritious midday meal in comfort

  • A solid base of sponsors who provide vital sacks of rice to feed the family and the whole compound

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kitchen at pakau Njogu built by helping charity
Building Projects

We: 

  • Are extending our nurseries to increase our childcare provision

  • Are equipping our nurseries with sheltered eating areas and art areas

  • Built and now support and resource the community Maternity Clinic, serving 17 villages 

  • Maintain and improve our Helping Lodge which provides employment for local people, encouraging self-sufficiency 

Two men in the foreground are walking towards a building and pointing towards it.

Training and Empowering Local People

As well as training and employing school staff we: 

  • Use The Lodge as a training centre for upskilling and empowering local people

  • Employ Gambian professionals to teach safeguarding measures to teachers 

  • Employ Gambian health professionals to instruct teenage girls on reproductive health

  • Educate small groups of teenage girls to make eco-friendly, reusable personal sanitary products to enable them to attend school during menstruation

  • Staff The Lodge with local people and 

  • Use local craftsmen to repair and improve it whenever necessary

Gambian staff area all wearing yellow HELPING t-shirts and are behind a training venue's table.
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