Welcome Back!

You have Gifts for Good in your basket.

Checkout Now
Continue shopping for more gifts

Welcome Back!

Last time you were here, you were looking to help vulnerable children and families. Your support can save and change lives.

Donate Now
Learn more about our appeals

My name is Albertina. I am 18 years old. I live in Zambia with my mother, my grandmother and my siblings.

I have been a sponsored child with ChildFund since I was five years old.

When I grew up, I realised I wanted to be involved in activities for young people and so I became a peer educator with ChildFund in 2013.

As a peer educator I hold meetings where I educate people in my community. I talk with and mentor people in my same age group about things like early marriage, early pregnancy, staying in school, etc.

At school, what I saw was bad. It troubled me. The majority of children who were married at my school dropped out in Grade 6. They did not continue to high school.

It hurt to see that. Although you start school at the same time and you started as many, only two or three of you complete your education.

Of all my friends who I started school with, all of them have dropped out of school. They have all married early and started having children. I saw this practice was harmful.

We all have many problems, but when you look at the girls who dropped out and got married, they have more problems.

Children who are married do not get to do the things they desire and accomplish their goals.

I believe that every person has things to be accomplished in their life.

I want to pursue journalism so that I can continue what I’m doing in the community. By working in the media, I’ll be able to reach more people than I can right now.

Mary and Rehema sleep in adjoining bunks at a girls’ dormitory built by ChildFund at a school in Samburu County, Kenya.

They’re both 14, and when they get a little older, they both want to work in healthcare. There’s something empowering about the idea of becoming a professional healer. Where they’re from, girls don’t often get that opportunity.

In the pastoral communities of north-central Kenya, the pace of life rises and falls with the seasons.

The sweltering blue sky of the dry season grows gray and heavy when the rains come, first the short rains and, later, the long.

Livestock — the basis of the local economy — are born, have their own babies and die. Most children grow up helping their families look after cattle, donkeys, camels and goats.

But for girls — who often aren’t encouraged to go to school — livestock sometimes becomes the inherent, inadvertent purpose of their lives, the limit of their learnings about the world.

By subscribing, you agree to receive communication from ChildFund Australia.