Tujenge Opportunity Fund

Tujenge Africa Foundation is raising funds to launch a pilot program for its new initiative, the Tujenge Opportunity Fund. This program will directly support the university education of six high-achieving Burundian scholars by funding tuition and living costs.

 

Problem Statement

 

The Tujenge Africa Foundation’s primary initiative, the Tujenge Scholars Program, is a peacebuilding and leadership incubator that simultaneously prepares students to bridge the gap between high school and university. Nearly all of our past scholars have received admission and a scholarship to international universities and colleges across the globe. Since our first cohort in 2017, more than 93 % of our scholars have received financial aid and scholarships to enroll in universities. These 92 students have collectively received more than $7.4M in financial aid.

 

Nonetheless, because the admissions process is so unpredictable, a small percentage of our scholars (six scholars over 4 cohorts) were not accepted or did not receive full scholarships. Our most difficult challenge has been, specifically, obtaining full scholarships because our scholars cannot afford to pay international universities. These scholars don't continue their studies not because they fail to value the 18 months that they spent in Tujenge Program, but simply because they cannot financially access education in the long run.

 

Proposed Approach

 

To that end, we are developing a project to approach this from a new and innovative perspective - supporting all of our scholars who were not admitted to international universities or who were admitted but did not receive scholarships so that they can attend local universities. Specifically, those six scholars were denied admission or a scholarship for any reason, or they were unable to finish school due to health or other issues. Indeed, for this pilot program, we propose working with those non-university students ranging from the first to the fourth cohort. We are committed to assisting these scholars in accessing their undergraduate studies at local universities.

 

We are also excited that the administration of the program will be handled by an alumnus from Tujenge Scholars Program’s second cohort. Jean de Dieu Ndayishimiye has been hired to lead and manage the initiative, ensuring that the project’s aims and expectations are consistently and transparently met.

 

Project Aims

 

Through this program, Tujenge Africa Foundation aims at

 

Project Timeline

 

We believe that starting as soon as possible would be the best approach for our potential scholars because they have spent at least two years after high school graduation. As a result, we planned for this to begin in the upcoming academic year, which begins in September 2022. This implies that we have three months to raise funds for the first year, and we are confident that with your support, they will be able to start this year once we have all of the necessary funds.

 

Project Budget

 

The Tujenge Opportunity Fund will assist these six scholars in attending their preferred local universities through this program. Then, in addition to monitoring scholars' educational progress, this project will undoubtedly and unavoidably necessitate our financial capability so that scholars can afford their basic needs for University programs and living expenses. The following is a breakdown of our allocated budget for these program scholars to be successful and effective:

 

 

 

 

Tuition and a living stipend (including registration fees, class supplies, housing, transport, and food) for six scholars, a basic health emergency fund, and salary for a 3/4-time administrator are covered in the budget above.

 

Fundraising Goals

 

We expect to hold fundraising drives once or twice per year, to meet our budgetary goals. If fundraisers surpass fundraising goals, we will roll any surplus funds forward to future years of the fund. To finance the pilot program, we expect to raise $8,500 per year for three years through community crowdfunding campaigns.

 

For this campaign, our suggested donation benchmarks are based on the cost of tuition and living stipend for each scholar (and rounded to reasonable values). A single donation of $1,000 will fully cover these costs, while donations of $500 and $250 will cover half and one-quarter.

 

For donors who prefer to make monthly donations, they may sign up for a recurring monthly donation through Tujenge’s PayPal donation page for this campaign: (https://www.tujenge.org/donate-opportunity-fund).
 

 

 

 

More information about the Tujenge Opportunity Fund can be found in the Project Proposal, https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dQZUuyF_khsCPk3Ut7wLKlQURC4SBTJ6ga5scvwwdg8/edit?usp=sharing