Tanzania Project

We expect students to make significant contributions to the community through our Service as Action and Community Service programmes. Some of these go beyond the campus of MIS. Our outreach programmes with UNICEF and Tanzania are two important examples of our commitment to global mindedness.

 

History

In the summer of 1990, under the leadership of the Headmaster at the time, Lister Hannah, MIS students Jesse Garcia and Nickie Shaver travelled to Tanzania with teachers Carol Geiger and Mark McGough to establish a helping relationship with the people of Tanzania.

This relationship has evolved since that first visit into a significant component of the MIS Community outreach. A team of approximately 20-25 students and staff travel to Tanzania each year at the beginning of the summer vacation to visit the projects which MIS supports and to undertake service projects there.  The trips in 2020 and 2021 were cancelled because of the CO-VID 19 global pandemic.

 

Purposes

 We support projects which directly benefit individuals or groups of individuals in need and have  the following purposes:

1. Education

We support projects which advance the education of needy children and the further education of needy young adults in Tanzania by providing and assisting in the provision of facilities and resources and the payment of tuition fees.

2. Health

We support projects which advance the health of needy people in Tanzania by helping people to maintain or improve their physical and mental health, by preventing or curing ill-health and disease, and by providing medical equipment and facilities to promote health and emotional and social well-being and to relieve pain and suffering of the needy.

3. Poverty and Hardship

We support projects which seek to relieve poverty and hardship by providing food,  goods and services to needy people In Tanzania.  We support projects which support those needy members of communities, particularly women, who are responsible and carry  most of the financial and social burden for those communities.

4. Social Welfare

We support projects which provide recreational and leisure time activities for needy people in Tanzania designed to improve the quality of  life of those in need.

Currently supported MIS projects
  • Occupational Therapy Clinic – this is part of the Tuamani University of Tanzania, based at KCMC hospital. This project started in 1998 to help establish the OT department with the training of six students that has now grown to 30. 
  • Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre – MIS has supported this hospital for over 20 years by providing some tangible support such as: stethoscopes, foetal heart monitor, ordinary drugs, etc.
  • Hope Primary School in Moshi – project started in 2013 in a very poor area of the town. Most of the students at this school are orphans. MIS helps to keep this 2-room school keep going and provide some basic education.
  • Hadea (Haven Nature Development Association), in Karatu near N'goro n'goro, is a non-profit organisation registered in Tanzania, which serves elderly people and children with physical disabilities in the Karatu region, not far from N’goro n’ goro crater. It provides a Home-Based Care programme which supports vulnerable families by bringing food and providing care services in the home. MIS started supporting this project in 2019. MIS’ donations have supported the purchase of a wheelchair, food, clothes and blankets for the elderly and people with disabilities.
  • Supporting local villages in Lower Moshi (Kilimanjaro Region, Tanzania) with expansion in Primary School and rural infrastructure (in collaboration with FT Kilimanjaro, NGO). 
  • Tree Planting in Mchame, near Moshi, on the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro to replenish the local primary forest that has been denuded over the past few years. This work is being done through a local NGO that is connected to the “Roots and Shoots” foundation.
  • Upendo Children’s Orphanage – in Moshi, started in 2018.
  • Music for Music Group – HIV infected teens in Moshi. Project support started about 10 years ago. It is an outreach programme out of KCMC hospital. MIS supports this group by providing musical instruments and other socio-cultural related materials.
  • Work project at a local primary school in Moshi – MIS students will be engaged in renovating, digging, painting and other kinds of labour intensive work. Every year, a different local primary school will be helped. Although MIS has helped different local schools over the past 25 years, this particular initiative is in collaboration with ISM (International School of Moshi) and was started in 2015.
Projects supported in the past
  • 4T Project (Tuungane Tusaidiane Tuijenge Tanzania: “Let´s join together Let´s help together Let´s help each other Let´s build Tanzania") – long term association with this local NGO since around 2004; 4T is a self-help project that supports women, which began in a village near Arusha where we annually donate donkeys, goats, basic farming equipment, chicken-coops and school uniforms.