A Family’s Hope
FLORA’S STORY - NOVEMBER 2024
Not many ninth-grade students carry as heavy a burden as Uwase Flora.
The second born of seven siblings, she was the only one attending school during the summer of 2024. This marked the end of her second academic year at Hope Haven Christian School, where she began her journey two years earlier as a Senior 2 (8th grade) student.
Flora’s life took a pivotal turn in early 2022 when the leadership team from Hope Haven visited her province, scouting for prospective students. The administrators at her local day school highlighted Flora’s exceptional academic achievements and potential, while also expressing concerns over her family’s dire financial situation, which threatened her education. Without assistance, Flora would have had to drop out and seek work—washing clothes, farming, or caring for her younger siblings—to help support her family.
Life at Hope Haven was transformative for Flora. She was grateful for the opportunity to attend an institution of such quality, especially considering the severe poverty her family faced. Her family’s hardships were rooted in their tumultuous past. As Rwandan refugees in Tanzania, they had not moved back to Rwanda after the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. When they were chased back to Rwanda, they walked as a family of 9 for over a month to reach Rwanda with very little other than the clothes on their backs. Flora’s parents, without formal education or national IDs, took whatever jobs they could find to sustain their large family. A friend initially offered help, but when she lost her job, the family’s struggle deepened. They would frequently move from one place to another because they couldn’t pay rent.
One afternoon this past June, Flora was found crying instead of eating her lunch. Members of the Family Department noticed and asked why. They discovered she felt intense guilt for eating three meals a day while knowing her family often went without food. Moved by her story, Priscillah Kembabazi, the Family Department Director, visited Flora’s home with food supplies. Priscillah soon realized just how desperate the family’s situation was and took swift action. She and her team found the family a four-room house and paid the rent. Then they assisted them with moving from the one-room house they had been staying in and would have been moving from in a few days because of the inability to pay anything. Additionally, Flora’s younger siblings were evaluated and enrolled at Hope Haven for the current academic year, and her father was offered a job as a security guard on the secondary campus—a position he readily accepted.
Flora’s mother, reflecting on the change in their lives, said, “If it wasn’t for Hope Haven, my family and I would be hopeless and homeless.” The transformation is clear; the family’s outlook has brightened significantly. Thanks to her father’s new job, the family can afford rent and food, and her mother’s contributions on campus help cover the educational costs for Flora and her siblings.
Despite the challenges surrounding her family, Flora excelled in her national exams in July, receiving a perfect score of “54”, and entered Senior 4 (10th grade) this September with confidence. She has chosen to concentrate in physics, chemistry, and biology, driven by her dream to become a doctor, specifically a pediatrician.
Because of prayers and support from partners like you, Flora and her family live with hope and the tangible promise of a brighter, more secure future where they are contributing members of society.
This is just ONE story of so many.
With 80% of our student’s families eking out a meager existence, you can change the story so they can THRIVE and make a difference.
Join us and give these students a HAND UP to change the world!