If evolution has indeed left us hardwired to be social and derive satisfaction from altruism, then it's obviously not just the affluent who have these needs. Indeed, some interesting initiatives give the poor the rewards that come with helping others, and one of the most intriguing is the Restore Leadership Academy in Uganda. Its impoverished students raise money to help American kids.
The academy was founded by Bob Goff, an American lawyer who is a passionate believer in self-help and self-efficacy, and who exudes those same qualities. When his law school application was rejected, he camped outside the dean's office for a week until the dean surrendered and accepted him. Many years later, as a veteran traveler to Uganda, Goff started Restore in 2007 with just four students. It now has a middle school and a high school, with forty teachers and 350 coed students, including former child soldiers and orphans. They all grew up knowing only poverty and conflict. Official test scores from Restore Leadership Academy have ranked it as the second-best school in northern Uganda in academics and the best in athletics. Pupils pay partial tuition and donors cover the rest, including tuition, food, school supplies, medicine, and a sports program. Funders can support a student at the academy for $30 a month.
For fear of breeding dependency, Goff ensures that the students don't perceive themselves as charity cases. They plant, grow, and sell their own crops to pay for their education, and they engage in public service projects such as repairing wells. Then the academy proposed something that raised eyebrows: raising money to donate to needy kids in America. "We wanted to give the kids a sense of empowerment," explains Deborah Eriksson, the executive director of Restore International, which oversees the academy. "We wanted to switch the idea from they are just beneficiaries of help to 'I am strong enough, I can give.' "
The academy chose as its target charity The Mentoring Project, which is based in Portland, Oregon, and supports at-risk boys who don't have dads. Such an organization resonated with the Ugandan children, for many in their community had lost fathers and they intuitively understood the need for mentors. Helping kids in a rich country was novel for the Ugandan students. "They see Westerners come over on trips and they seem insanely wealthy," Eriksson noted. "Kids probably think: 'They could help me so much, they have so much money.' We like the idea of switching that thinking because we don't want them to just think that 'people from the States are here to help me, pity me, and they have it all figured it out.' We want them to think in terms of friendship, and all around the world there are folks who need help."
John Sowers, president of The Mentoring Project, was stunned when he received an email explaining that a group of impoverished Ugandan children recovering from war planned a donation. "How can these kids give to us?" he wondered. "I was thinking, 'Wait a second. I've been giving money to Africa, and I can't take money from Africa.' "
He recalls telling Goff, Bob, I don't know if we can take money from you guys. Empowering these kids to give, Goff replied, is the best thing we can do for them.
Samuel Oboma, a Restore academy graduate now at university and aiming to become a lawyer, says that the students were eager to help their American counterparts. His own father was killed in the war in northern Uganda a week before he was born, and his mother was jobless, so he never had much to share - and that made the chance to help needy American kids even more special. "It's something wonderful," Samuel said. "It's not only people within Africa or a specific part of the world who need help... It's good to give a hand to whoever needs it. In any part of the world you're responsible, irrespective of race or color."
In Oregon, Sowers gradually came around to the idea of accepting money from Ugandan students: "I want to see the kids as victims, and they have been victimized, but Bob is all about empowering them. So Bob's idea was for them to give to us. And what an amazing idea for them to give to this country - and you're impacting America and Uganda and everyone else. That blew me away." So far, the Ugandan youngsters have raised $830, which goes to training, supporting, and recruiting mentors for the American youngsters. Every month, the Ugandan students raise another $25 or so.
Nicholas Kristof & Sheryl WuDunn "A Path Appears" (2014)
