O Ambassadors are Helping Children in Developing Countries

My children and I watched a wonderful programme from the Oprah Winfrey show about the O AMBASSADORS program. Oprah's Angel Network set this up with Craig Kielburger from Free the Children. US schools can apply to join the program. They receive a curriculum to teach them about the lives of children in a particular area of the developing world. Hopefully this will inspire the school children to want to raise money to help the less privileged children and work towards achieving the Millenium Development Goals.

What are the Millennium Development Goals?
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) focus on four major issues affecting our world today: poverty, education, health and sustainable development. Set for the year 2015, the MDGs are targets agreed upon by world leaders who have all promised to do their part in helping millions of people to break the cycle of poverty.

Volunteer projects
Some even have the opportunity to volunteer for a working project eg 12 teenagers spent three weeks in Kenya building a school with their bare hands and hand tools such as picks and shovels. They had a bare piece of ground around which they had to dig a trench. The laid the bricks, prepared the walls, installed window frames and roof rafters.

The American teenagers also spent time with the Kenyan children understanding their way of life, visiting their infested water source and one girl in her home. She was so proud of learning to read English that when she read a page in the newspaper, she stuck it on the wall. She also made paper patterns from her schoolbooks and hung them from the ceiling.

The teenagers spoke of how particular aspects of their experience had been life changing, certainly making them grateful for things we take for granted such as clean water from a tap. Oprah introduced the programme as one to share with children to inspire them. My boys spoke afterwards of what the program had meant to them.

Find out how your school can participate in O Ambassadors at www.OAmbassadors.org or make an online donation.