Season’s Greetings and a Happy New Year!!

The end of 2015 is here. We want to thank you for your support of the Tanzania Nursing Scholarship Program (TNSP) and provide you with a summary of our accomplishments this year:

• Twenty young women who received financial assistance through TNSP completed their nursing studies and graduated during 2015.
• During the current school term, you helped sponsor 45 young ladies at five schools across Tanzania. We anticipate 21 will graduate in 2016.
• Since inception, sixty-six young women have graduated with assistance from the Tanzania Nursing Scholarship Program.

Programs at each of the five schools are three-years in duration, culminating in receipt of a diploma. Following completion of a national examination, students are granted the professional designation  of Registered Nurse and Registered Midwife. Many sponsored graduates also wish to continue their studies by enrolling in a bachelor program. In fact, four of our sponsored graduates are now enrolled in bachelor degree programs.

One of our long-term goals is to have program graduates serve as mentors and role models for current students. Sarah Mdete and Tegemea Mwalingo (both 2011 graduates and current BA students), serve as mentors at schools in Dar es Salaam and Dodoma, respectively.

We have had a very exciting fall season. In a prior newsletter we mentioned that Lilian Mejool, a tutor/instructor, at Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center (KCMC) in Moshi would spend the fall semester as a Visiting Scholar at the University of Massachusetts College of Nursing in Amherst, Massachusetts. Lilian arrived August 20 and stayed until December 12. Tony and I hosted her visit. Her primary focus was to learn how the Simulation Lab at the College of Nursing was utilized. She intends to apply her experiences on her return to the Skills Lab at KCMC. Lilian intends to share her findings with other schools in Tanzania.We are grateful to everyone at UMass for making Lilian’s visit such a success.

During her visit, we did a great deal of cooking. Lilian was surprised at the variety and preparation of food that we serve in the U.S. She also enjoyed celebrating her birthday, a traditional Thanksgiving dinner and shortly before leaving she prepared a traditional Tanzanian dinner for a few neighbors. Our traditional Tanzanian meal included rice pilau with pork, banana stew with beef, and katchumbari (salad). Here a book with many wonderful Tanzanian recipes.

Lilian is a great cook and everyone enjoyed the meal. There were many questions to Lilian about Tanzania, a lot of laughter and many well wishes for Lilian’s safe return home. We were sad to wave good-bye at the airport, but so happy to have spent time getting to know her. We miss her already. Lilian has been a great friend and a lot of help working with us with students at KCMC. Below are pictures of our Tanzanian dinner.

In other news, we added a new board member, Rebecca Jones Munger. Rebecca teaches midwifery and resides in Northern California. Tony met her on his last trip to Tanzania at the Mirembe School of Nursing in Dodoma. Rebecca was a Peace Corp volunteer and taught midwifery at Mirembe for one year. Before returning to the states, Rebecca visited the Tukuyu School of Nursing where she gave several lectures on midwifery and met with students. She has since returned home to California, but will be leaving in early January to teach midwifery at a nursing school in Uganda for 6 months. She has a great heart for Africa and we are very excited to have her on the board.

Tony will be leaving for Tanzania in the middle of February for five weeks. He initially arrives in Moshi and will be staying at our favorite B&B, Tembo Tamu. He is looking forward to visiting with our current and graduated students and other friends.

Again, we are grateful for your support.

Sincerely,
Linda
Linda van Werkhooven, President