Empathy FX International

Every woman should have access to sanitary products. A gift of $20 can provide a woman in Ghana with sanitary pads for a full year.

We’re excited to launch the second annual Every Woman Project – Ghana fundraiser. We remain committed to providing sanitary pads to the women and students of Old Odonase, a small village in Ghana.

Without these products, women may fall behind in school and resort to unsanitary alternatives such as rags, which risks infections. A period should not end a woman's opportunity to succeed. We're changing that.

We invite you to be a part of our mission to improve the lives of the women of Old Odonase, Ghana.

Thanks to the incredible generosity of our donors last year, we provided 12 months of sanitary pads to every woman in the remote farming village of Old Odonase, Ghana in West Africa. We're continuing our commitment to ensure every woman has access to sanitary pads in 2025.

In addition to distributing sanitary pads to every woman, we also developed "Girl Talk", where we have conversations with female students to share common experiences and destigmatize period health. With the support of the educators at Old Odonase, our incredible partner in Ghana now leads these sessions.

Prior to 2024, the majority of these young women had never used sanitary products before. They used rags and often missed school, which led to them falling behind. The girls’ attendance in school has increased significantly, and they’re feeling confident.

We’re so grateful for our donors and our incredible partners in Ghana who make this work possible.

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It is vital that girls and boys are given equal opportunity. Many girls in poverty stricken areas like Old Odonase, do not have access to sanitary pads and often miss school due to their periods. This has been a problem that disadvantaged Ghanaian girls have faced for many years. The situation worsens as sanitary pads in Ghana become increasingly unaffordable.

The BBC reported on August 11, 2023 in an article called “Period poverty: African women priced out of buying sanitary pads” that the situation is becoming more dire as sanitary pads in Ghana have become the most expensive products relative to monthly income of six African countries studied. The study showed that women on the minimum wage have to spend 13% of their salary to buy two packets of sanitary towels, which is what many women will need in a month.

When women don’t have access to sanitary products in relation to their education:

Some girls will stay home from school during their period if they do not have access to sanitary pads. With periods lasting 4-7 days on average, this means a girl could be missing 1 week of school per month.

Without a sanitary pad or access to changing the pad frequently, a girl’s school uniform may get stained. The majority of students only have one uniform. The teasing and mockery that comes with having to wear a blood stained uniform to school everyday has made girls stop their schooling.

It is also common that when these young women and their families are not able to afford pads on their own, they will go to a boyfriend for the money. We spoke with a Ghanaian woman, who is now in her early thirties, who explained that girls are forced to turn to a boyfriend but “there is no free lunch” so she recalls some of her classmates getting pregnant and having to drop out. The BBC Article titled “Period poverty: African women priced out of buying sanitary pads” quotes a 22 year old Ghanaian woman, who said “The only person available to help wants sex before he gives me the money. I have to do it because I need pads for the month”.

These young women are forced to rely on boyfriends to buy period products and this dependent relationship can lead to pregnancy, ultimately forcing them to drop out of school.

In January 2024, I spent the day in Old Odonase, Ghana speaking with groups of about twenty girls at a time having “Girl Talk” sessions.

The village of Old Odonase is located in the Central Region of Ghana and was humid with temperatures in the high 90s. The women don’t have access to tap water but there are two wells in the village. There is a toilet in the tech center that was gifted to Old Odonase through Empathy FX in 2022. Because of the modern facilities like the tech center, many children from neighboring villages walk to Old Odonase each day to get the best education that they can. The school goes from Nursery/ Kindergarten through Junior High School. The government in Ghana does not support the schools so they rely on outside help to get their basic needs met. We talked about their experiences with menstruation and the commonality that women around the world face. For the first time, the group of girls and their teachers spoke openly about their shared experiences from staining uniforms, getting teased, and feeling shame. The students left their “Girl Talk” groups feeling empowered, smiling as they left with their first supply of sanitary supplies.

We talked about how to use pads and made sure they knew that more sanitary pads would be coming. It was important to me that the girls really used the pads and weren’t worried that they would run out. I’ve been told that many women in Ghana, who are lucky enough to have access to pads, will either cut their pads in half so the supply lasts longer or change them just one time per day. The cost of pads in Ghana compared to a family’s income makes it pretty impossible to afford pads in Old Odonase. I let the girls know that while the pads are expensive and seen as a luxury, they shouldn’t be. These pads are a basic human need that give girls a better chance to succeed. These girls want to succeed and finish their education. They’re determined.

Our goal is to provide 200 women with 12 months worth of sanitary pads. Let’s start there and keep going. Join us in giving these girls the access to education through your support.

-Emma Hayes, February 2024

Thank you in advance for your support. It means the world to me and the people of Old Odonase, Ghana who are beyond grateful for our community of donors.

Follow along at @makeyourmarkinafrica on Instagram and www.empathyfx.org/every-woman-project

Help Sarah Continue her Education: 24-Hour Sponsorship Challenge!

I’m raising funds to help Sarah, a 16-year-old from Old Odonase, Ghana, continue her education and attend Senior High School. Any donation will make a difference!

Our Goal: $818

• $400 for admission fees

• $418 for the rest of the school year expenses

Sarah Doughan is a 16-year-old from Old Odonase, Ghana, who dreams of becoming a medical doctor. After excelling in her Junior High School at Old Odonase exams, Sarah earned a spot at Methodist High School in Saltpond, a government-assisted boarding school. Now, she just needs our help to make it there.

I visited Old Odonase in January 2024 and met Sarah while she was a Junior High School student. She stood out as one of the brightest kids in the rural village, but also one of the most in need. I promised her that if she got accepted to senior high school, we’d help make her dream possible. That time is now, and she needs our support.

A Message from Sarah:

“Sarah Doughan is my name. I have just completed my junior high school at Old Odonase. I have successfully passed my exams and gained admission at Methodist Senior High School at Saltpond in Ghana. We have been asked to report to school on November 7th, 2024. But because I’m an orphan I’m finding it very difficult to buy the things in my prospectus (list of things a student is required to bring to school). Kindly assist me to continue my education to reach my dreams of being a medical doctor in the future. I will be glad if you could support me. Thank you.”

— Sarah Doughan, 16 years old from Old Odonase, Ghana

**Link to video of Sarah speaking here!

Sarah lost her father earlier this year and has been without her mother since childhood. With no living family, Sarah’s hope rests on the kindness and generosity of others. Her former Junior High School headmaster and community members are doing their best to support her, but they need our help to sponsor her education

Every dollar you give will go directly toward Sarah’s admission fees and school expenses. This will enable her to start her high school education, paving the way for her to complete her education to eventually become a doctor and give back to her community.

Thanks in advance for your contribution to this cause that means so much to me!

Follow along on my journey leading projects in Ghana @makeyourmarkinafrica under Empathy FX International .

More information about Empathy FX International: Empathy FX International is a 501 (C) 3 organization headquartered in San Jose, CA. Empathy FX is committed to increasing access to quality education for each person in Ghana.

Every woman should have access to sanitary products. A gift of $20 can provide a woman in Ghana with sanitary pads for a full year.

We're committed to providing sanitary pads to the women and students of Old Odonase, a small village in Ghana.

Without these products, women may fall behind in school and resort to unsanitary alternatives such as rags, which risks infections. A period should not end a woman's opportunity to succeed. Let's change that.

We invite you to be a part of our mission to improve the lives of the women of Old Odonase, Ghana.

It is vital that girls and boys are given equal opportunity. Many girls in poverty stricken areas like Old Odonase, do not have access to sanitary pads and often miss school due to their periods. This has been a problem that disadvantaged Ghanaian girls have faced for many years. The situation worsens as sanitary pads in Ghana become increasingly unaffordable.

The BBC reported on August 11, 2023 in an article called “Period poverty: African women priced out of buying sanitary pads” that the situation is becoming more dire as sanitary pads in Ghana have become the most expensive products relative to monthly income of six African countries studied. The study showed that women on the minimum wage have to spend 13% of their salary to buy two packets of sanitary towels, which is what many women will need in a month.

When women don’t have access to sanitary products in relation to their education:

 

Some girls will stay home from school during their period if they do not have access to sanitary pads. With periods lasting 4-7 days on average, this means a girl could be missing 1 week of school per month.

Without a sanitary pad or access to changing the pad frequently, a girl’s school uniform may get stained. The majority of students only have one uniform. The teasing and mockery that comes with having to wear a blood stained uniform to school everyday has made girls stop their schooling.

It is also common that when these young women and their families are not able to afford pads on their own, they will go to a boyfriend for the money. We spoke with a Ghanaian woman, who is now in her early thirties, who explained that girls are forced to turn to a boyfriend but “there is no free lunch” so she recalls some of her classmates getting pregnant and having to drop out. The BBC Article titled “Period poverty: African women priced out of buying sanitary pads” quotes a 22 year old Ghanaian woman, who said “The only person available to help wants sex before he gives me the money. I have to do it because I need pads for the month”.

These young women are forced to rely on boyfriends to buy period products and this dependent relationship can lead to pregnancy, ultimately forcing them to drop out of school.

In January 2024, I spent the day in Old Odonase, Ghana speaking with groups of about twenty girls at a time having “Girl Talk” sessions.

The village of Old Odonase is located in the Central Region of Ghana and was humid with temperatures in the high 90s. The women don’t have access to tap water but there are two wells in the village. There is a toilet in the tech center that was gifted to Old Odonase through Empathy FX in 2022. Because of the modern facilities like the tech center, many children from neighboring villages walk to Old Odonase each day to get the best education that they can. The school goes from Nursery/ Kindergarten through Junior High School. The government in Ghana does not support the schools so they rely on outside help to get their basic needs met. We talked about their experiences with menstruation and the commonality that women around the world face. For the first time, the group of girls and their teachers spoke openly about their shared experiences from staining uniforms, getting teased, and feeling shame. The students left their “Girl Talk” groups feeling empowered, smiling as they left with their first supply of sanitary supplies.

We talked about how to use pads and made sure they knew that more sanitary pads would be coming. It was important to me that the girls really used the pads and weren’t worried that they would run out. I’ve been told that many women in Ghana, who are lucky enough to have access to pads, will either cut their pads in half so the supply lasts longer or change them just one time per day. The cost of pads in Ghana compared to a family’s income makes it pretty impossible to afford pads in Old Odonase. I let the girls know that while the pads are expensive and seen as a luxury, they shouldn’t be. These pads are a basic human need that give girls a better chance to succeed. These girls want to succeed and finish their education. They’re determined.

Our goal is to provide 200 women with 12 months worth of sanitary pads. Let’s start there and keep going. Join us in giving these girls the access to education through your support.

-Emma Hayes

Thank you in advance for your support. It means the world to me and the people of Old Odonase, Ghana who are beyond grateful for our community of donors.

Follow along at @makeyourmarkinafrica on Instagram and www.empathyfx.org/every-woman-project

Please join me in raising money to benefit the nursery school in Old Odonase, Ghana. We’ll be finishing the classroom by cementing and painting both the interior and exterior of the building. We’ll also be providing bookshelves for the classroom to store new school supplies and books for the children. Any donation will make an impact.

Following the success of a pillar repair project on November 8th, the Headmaster expresses his gratitude for the gift and his dream to repair the nursery through a video that can be watched here as he stands in the building that we’ll be repairing.

My first contribution to Old Odonase was when I was 16 years old. I’m opening up this fundraiser through November 19th, which is my 31st birthday.

After spending the summer of 2009 in Ghana, I raised money to start building the first classroom in Old Odonase. Fourteen years later, Empathy FX’s commitment has provided Old Odonase with access to school for students from nursery through junior high school.

Our partner in Ghana, Nana Aggrey-Fynn, outlined the prices in the breakdown below.

Total Cost= $1,716

Breakdown:

1. 30 bags of cements = 2,850 cedis

2. 1 double axel of sand = 2,500 cedis

3. 2 buckets of shield paint = 1500 cedis

4. 2 buckets of oil paint = 500 cedis

5. 2 buckets of oil paint thinners = 320 cedis

6. Labors of masons = 1,800 cedis

7. Labors of Painter = 1,400 cedis

8. KG school supplies = 4000 cedis

9. 4 days Transportation = 2,000 cedis

10. Book shelves= 3,500 cedis

Total= 20,370 cedis + bank charge of $10

Thanks in advance for your contribution to this cause that means so much to me.

Follow along on my journey @makeyourmarkinafrica as we build 2 classrooms and cover feminine supplies, uniforms, and desks in early 2024 through Empathy FX.

More information about Empathy FX International: Empathy FX International is a 501 (C) 3 organization headquartered in San Jose, CA. Empathy FX is committed to increasing access to quality education for each person in Ghana.

Empathy FX International works to increase access to quality education and medical services in Ghana. Since 2009, we have built five schools and a technology center, serving over 1,000 students for whom a primary education was previously unavailable. Our goal is to break the cycle of poverty by ensuring that all children in Ghana have access to education in their local village. We also diagnose and treat over 100 malaria patients each year.

In 2022, we built a technology center and library in the village of Old Odonase, in the Central Region of Ghana. This trip was inspired and conceived by Bernard Abakah, who grew up in Old Odonase and recently received a master’s degree in chemistry from East Tennessee State University. When Bernard was in high school, Empathy FX visited his village and built a primary school. As a master’s student in the United States, Bernard reached out to Empathy FX founder Rosemary Hua DeAragon with the vision of returning to build a library and bring computers to his home community.

The Empathy FX Technology Center in Old Odonase is now equipped with over 4,000 books, 30 laptops preloaded with educational content, 10 desktop computers, and a projector. In August, 2022, our team traveled to Ghana to host a three-day computer workshop with 30 teachers from around the region. Teachers from each attending district were able to bring two laptops back to their home schools.

Shortly after our trip to Old Odonase, Juliet Ohemeng-Ntiamoah, an environmental engineer in Tennessee, reached out to us. She heard about our work in Old Odonase and was hoping we would take on a similar technology center project in her home village of Odubi, in Ghana’s Ashanti Region.

Our technology center and library model is a good one–it’s currently providing 400 students in Old Odonase with access to books, a wealth of preloaded educational content, and computer literacy training. The technology center in Odubi will provide 728 students with access to these same resources.

Please help us build a technology center in Odubi. We believe a little empathy can go a long way!

For more information on Empathy FX International, visit our website !

The nonprofit Empathy FX International is requesting donations for a May 2022 trip to Ghana to open a library in the village of Old Odonase. The library will serve over 400 students from grade school through high school. Donations will fund the purchase of textbooks, educational materials, young adult fiction, and nonfiction, to help improve literacy and prepare students for ongoing education. Empathy FX is a 501(c)(3) non-profit. All donations are fully tax deductible.

 

Thanks in advance for your contribution to this cause that means so much to me.

 

 

 

 

Hi everyone! I just got back from Ghana and wanted to share a meaningful project that I've been working on since August 2024.

Help Us Complete Teacher Housing in Rural Ghana

We’re thrilled to share that we were awarded a $33,700 charitable grant from the Maldari Family Charitable Foundation to build teacher bungalows in Old Odonase, a rural farming village in the Central Region of Ghana in West Africa. Our total fundraising goal is $43,850.

Thanks to this generous support, we’ve made significant progress and have already constructed six housing units, which is our 2025 goal. Each unit includes a small kitchen, main room, and a bathroom with a toilet and shower. These bungalows will provide teachers with comfortable living spaces complete with running water and plumbing. These amenities are significant in the village where only two toilets currently exist at our technology center and were installed a few years ago.

Our goal is to attract and retain top educators by providing housing that is competitive with accommodations in more developed areas so students in Old Odonase can receive a consistent and high-quality education.

Why Teacher Housing Matters

Old Odonase School serves students from Nursery through Junior High School, drawing in children from surrounding villages due to its growing reputation and resources. Despite the school’s success, the lack of housing for teachers continues to be a major barrier for remote rural communities like Old Odonase. Teachers face long and difficult commutes. The teachers sometimes walk over an hour on rough dirt roads or wait hours for transportation from the nearest town, Abura Dunkwa.

These challenges result in frequent absences and turnover, which disrupts student learning. In August 2024, two dedicated teachers had to leave due to the difficult commute. Teachers with health issues are particularly affected. Without accessible and comfortable teacher housing, we risk losing great educators to schools with stronger resources.

Community-Driven Solution

The idea for teacher housing came directly from the educators and community during a town hall meeting in January 2024. Upon receiving the generous charitable grant, construction began with the support of the community and has been led by our Ghana-based Empathy FX International Team Lead/ Co-Founder, Nana Aggrey-Fynn, who has worked tirelessly for months to bring this vision to life.

Though the bungalows aren’t fully complete, the event brought together prominent community leaders including representatives from the Ghana Education Service, local government officials, Reverend Ministers from Cape Coast, the village chief, and former residents who traveled from far and near.

The guests, honorees, and community members of all ages eagerly rushed into the new units with excitement.

The reaction was overwhelmingly positive, with one young woman commenting, “I want to become a teacher at Old Odonase so I can live here!”

Impact on Students and the Future

Headmaster Emmanuel Nana Opoku Ankomah, who commutes up to 35 minutes each way by motorbike over rough roads, believes teacher housing will change everything. With on-site housing, teachers can arrive earlier, stay later, and support students beyond the school day, especially those who need extra help or have non-traditional schedules.

This project is about investing in a brighter future for students who are already breaking generational cycles of poverty through education. When we support teachers, we support entire communities.

Other Ways to Give

We are so close to completing this vision. Your donation will directly fund the final phase of construction, including plumbing and finishing touches to make the homes livable.

If you’d prefer to donate without platform fees, we also accept contributions via:

Zelle (Chase)

Check

GoFundMe deducts a 2.9% + $0.30 fee per transaction to ensure secure processing, but donations made via Zelle or check ensure 100% of your gift goes to the project. Please reach out to us directly for those details.

Thank you so much for your continued support. It means the world to me and the people of Old Odonase, Ghana who are beyond grateful for our community of donors.

Follow along at @makeyourmarkinafrica on Instagram and visit our website at https://www.empathyfx.org

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