oba
Supporting Girls’ Education

Supporting Girls’ Education

PROJECT

Supporting Girls’ Education


 

Operation Bootstrap Africa supports girls’ education by building and providing resources for numerous primary and secondary schools in Tanzania, Madagascar, and Kenya; as well as through a first-of-its-kind residential school for girls–the MaaSAE Girls Lutheran Secondary School (MGLSS).

MGLSS was founded to provide an opportunity for secondary education for the daughters of the Maasai and other semi-nomadic people of Tanzania. Today, 360 girls from mostly rural backgrounds are part of this nurturing and supportive educational community. In 2020, MGLSS celebrated its 25th anniversary, and in that time more than 800 girls had graduated from the school. Most of those graduates have gone on to achieve a college education, surpassing the educational level of 97% of Tanzanians. Among our graduates are doctors, nurses, teachers, architects, city planners, wildlife conservation specialists, pilots, and more. These young women are using their education to build a better Tanzania for future generations.

Other schools in Tanzania that OBA supports through scholarships and special projects include Olarash Primary School, Olchoki Primary School, and Moringe Sokoine Secondary School.

In Kenya, OBA has partnered with a rural community near the Ugandan border to build and renovate classrooms for Best School Academy, while in Madagascar we provide teacher salaries for the staff of five primary schools in some of the most remote, and poorest regions of the country.

In addition to these schools, OBA provides a scholarship fund for women pursuing post-secondary education, whether at a university or a technical or community college.

 

School Construction

School Construction

PROJECT

School Construction


 

For more than 50 years Operation Bootstrap Africa has partnered with local communities, leaders, and organizations in East Africa to build schools. Today we have built over 3,000 schools in rural Tanzania, Kenya and Madagascar.

At the request of Tanzania’s first president, “Mwalimu” (Teacher) Julius Nyerere, David Simonson founded Operation Bootstrap Africa in 1965 to fundraise for and provide primary schools to the newly independent country. Though the money for supplies came from generous donors in the West, the schools were built by the students’ families, with mud bricks shaped by hands and feet.

In the years since, infrastructure in Tanzania has improved greatly, and schools are now built by registered construction companies with concrete bricks and tin or steel roofs. Though we began with primary schools, OBA now also provides secondary and post-secondary schools, and has begun building schools in Kenya and Madagascar as well. All of our projects are still built in partnership with local communities, according to local priorities and needs.

Funding Healthcare Training & Projects

Funding Healthcare Training & Projects

PROJECT

Funding Healthcare Training and Projects


While OBA’s founder, David Simonson, focused his development efforts largely on education, his wife, being a trained nurse, also saw another great need in Tanzania. During their time as missionaries, Eunice began treating the ill and injured out of their home, hoping to alleviate some small part of the immense healthcare gap in the country. After founding the organization, Eunice, David, and Operation Bootstrap Africa worked to fundraise for and build hundreds of rural clinics and dispensaries in Tanzania.

Today OBA partners with a number of healthcare organizations in Tanzania. We support programming at the Arusha Lutheran Medical Centre (ALMC) and Selian Hospital in northern Tanzania, as well as at Plaster House – a pediatric rehabilitation center for children undergoing surgeries or other long term care who aren’t able to safely and healthily recuperate at home.

In addition to supporting and providing healthcare facilities, OBA also works to address the lack of skilled health care providers in Tanzania. Including doctors, nurses, midwives, and health aides, there are only 5 providers in Tanzania for every 10,000 people. In 2015, OBA partnered with ALMC and Dr. Mark Jacobson to start a nursing school which helps to fill some of this need. The ALMC School of Nursing provides 1, 2, and 3 year training programs for students pursuing degrees or certification in the fields of midwifery, community health, social work, and nursing. OBA provides a scholarship fund for the ALMC School of Nursing which subsidizes the cost of tuition for all students, and creates greater access to healthcare education.