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The Tesfa Foundation ==

The Tesfa Foundation is a charity that provides early childhood education to disadvantaged children in Ethiopia, where no public pre-school or kindergarten is available. Five schools have been founded by Tesfa in and around the capital city Addis Ababa and served more than 700 needy children in 2008. Tesfa schools have sister schools in the US and UK, and partner with local agencies to help the parents and communities of the children. The Charity

Leeza, (Fregenet Woubshet), a 29-year-old American citizen of Ethiopian origin, died in an auto accident in the summer of 2003. She had just completed her education in accounting and was about to embark on the work she saw for herself ahead: the support of her family in Ethiopia and, in the longer term, the assistance of the children of Ethiopia. She envisioned a day when she would open a school for needy children there.

Dana Roskey is the Tesfa Foundation founder and Director with both US and UK boards.

The Schools

Without publicly funded early childhood education, Ethiopian city children are unable to enter classrooms until age 7, while their middle-class and rich peers have the advantage of private schooling and exposure to books and educational resources from an early age. Many rural children still have no school within miles. Given the distances and the rigid daily schedules of town schools, too many rural children in Ethiopia are excluded from all education and opportunity. When Tesfa opened a kindergarten in the town of Mojo, five hundred families were waiting outside our doors to compete for 120 places. 1 The Tesfa Foundation has opened five schools to date. Each of them has a different profile. All address the severe needs of the very young and the poor. Our first school is the Tsegereda Memorial School in Addis Ababa, opened in October, 2004. It is named ‘Tsegereda’ in memory of Leeza Woubshet. 1

Tsegereda Memorial School Tsegereda is the Tesfa flagship school and serves thirty kindergarteners and thirty children in grades one to four, who came from the school's kindergarten programme. Many visitors from Europe and the United States have mentored the local teachers.

Bright Life School, Mojo The second Tesfa school opened in October 2006 in Mojo, a small town 100 kilometres south of Addis Ababa. Nine staff serve 120 kindergarteners from disadvantaged families. On registration day, 500 families showed up to apply. This school is now administered by an Ethiopian NGO called Bright Life for Children

Tsegereda, Gobame This is Tesfa’s first foray into non-formal primary education for rural populations. This school will serve 200 farmers' children from the area around the village of Gobame, outside Bahir Dar in the north of Ethiopia, with a condensed primary education delivered on a schedule amenable to the daily and annual schedules of farming families.

Tsegereda, Debre Zeit and Tsereha Tsion School, Mojo Both founded in autumn 2007, these schools are twinned in an experiment in sustainability and diversification of services. 2

Events

Twin Cities Marathon

Run to the Beat half marathon

The London Four music weekender  References

1. www.tesfa.org