This page highlights pictures from projects supported by Acts of Grace within the most recent five years.
Photos are listed in alphabetical order by charity name. Click on the charity's name to be redirected to its website. Click on the Grant Description link to learn more about each grant. These pictures are used with the express permission of the organization that provided them and are not to be reproduced for any other purpose.
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Schools in Lundazi-area, Zambia often focus on preparing students for university, however, most rural families are subsistence farmers and cannot afford it. Because of the focus on university, many Zambian students don't have opportunities to discover and cultivate their gifts in other practical areas such as skills, trades, and entrepreneurship. If students can't go to university and aren't guided how to pursue other paths, they have little to no options after graduation. The nearest skills training centre is 4 hours away, and high school graduates often end up joining high rates of unemployment. Even if students are raised in Christ-centred schools and taught to love as Christ does, when they have no tangible career application for that love, they often fall prey to negative lifestyles and social vices plaguing communities.
Pictured here: The new classroom for the sewing and tailoring trades, converted in Phase 1 from a previously existing chicken coop.
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Without skills & trades training programs, schools continue to produce at-risk graduates (or even drop-outs) who can't fully contribute to their families and communities as God intended. EduDeo's partner - Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (CCAP) - runs small-scale trades training programs at four high schools reaching nearly 2000 students each year. To reach even more students, CCAP is building a trades training centre is that will serve approximately 3000 more rural Zambian high school students annually. At the centre, students will be equipped and empowered with valuable skills in farming, sewing, computer hardware, carpentry, mechanics, brick-laying, and more.
Pictured here: The new open-sided workshop built in Phase 1.
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A foundational aspect of the training centre is its Christ-centred focus. Students who attend the training centre will not only develop a skill, they will also be able to connect their work and entire career to the Gospel, God's creation, and God's story for their lives.
In phase 1 of this project, three classrooms were built and/or converted from existing structures for computer hardware, bricklaying, sewing and tailoring trades and an open-sided workshop was built. The Acts of Grace grant for this project provides funds towards Phase 2 of this project which includes construction of 2 additional classrooms with all the necessary training materials and equipment.
Pictured here: The new computer hardware classroom built in Phase 1.
Expanding the Opportunities of Special Education (Dominican Republic)
Grant Year: 2019
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Across the Dominican Republic, the need for special education is great. Public schools are insufficiently equipped with the resources or knowledge to accommodate children with learning disabilities and behavioural difficulties. Material poverty further prevents many children from accessing private special education. Sinergia Leadership Foundation is a network of 15 Christian schools in the Dominican Republic. Within the network, Espacio de Gracia Christian School is the only school dedicated solely to special education, filling an educational gap not only in its own region, but also in an educational system as a whole.
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Currently, Espacio de Gracia only has enough space to accommodate its 70 students and 7 staff. More space and expanded services are in high demand. However, property in the Dominican Republic is both limited in availability and extremely expensive. A neighbouring sister Christian school is inspired by Espacio de Gracia's mission and has space to add more classrooms. The schools have merged under the single name and mission of Espacio de Gracia located in the larger sister school.
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This project will renovate the existing school to add two floors to the building including 8 new classrooms, a science lab, a computer lab, 2 offices and a meeting room. This additional space will double the school's enrollment capacity. The renovations will also create opportunity for Espacio de Gracia to enhance as well as expand its unique services to better serve its students and their communities.
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Impact Nations partners with leaders in the developing world to restore lives and transform communities by engaging people in practical and supernatural expressions of the Kingdom of God. Uganda is among the countries with the highest teenage pregnancies in Africa. Nearly 40% of women have given birth before the age of 18. One of Impact Nations' Ugandan partners, The Remnant Generation, serves young mothers and at-risk teens through a variety of programs, often survivor-led, tailored to each girl’s unique needs. As a practical expression of Christ to these women, The Remnant Generation focuses on the Gospel and Jesus as the driver of individual transformation. In particular, Impact Nations and The Remnant Generation are committed to helping young mothers and at-risk teens achieve a level of formal education to enable them to achieve their God-given purpose. With a vision to intervene in the lives of sexual abuse survivors, teen moms, and other vulnerable youth through holistic and integrated education that brings healing and restores dignity, the School of Purpose was established in 2017 in Kampala with 20 students.
Pictured here: A young woman learns to sew and tailoring skills.
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The School of Purpose is a skills training program that incorporates formal and informal teaching strategies to teach young women practical, marketable skills so that no girl is without hope. By 2022, the program had expanded to multiple communities, providing 862 vulnerable young women with education and mentorship. Students are selected for one of two course pathways. The Community Course (3 months) teaches simple skills such as soap-making wig construction, candle-making and sandal making and empowers women to start Business Clubs where they pool savings to invest in a joint business venture to support their families. The Vocational Course (8 months) emphasizes more complex skills such as sewing, salon-based hair care, baking, catering with an internship that will ultimately result in full-time employment after graduation. In Kampala, proper employment can be hard to find and women often resort to selling themselves for food. Impact Nations and The Remnant Generation have a vision to provide the Vocational Course training to hundreds of additional girls for many years to come.
Pictured here: A young woman learns hair-cutting and salon-based hair care skills.
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As the School of Purpose has grown, the existing structures have run out of both classroom and office space creating issues for both learners and staff and a proper classroom block, a new Education Building, is needed to provide higher quality training without interruptions. This new building will include six new classrooms and new washroom facilities and will be ready to enroll 100 additional students per year beginning in early 2024. For practical learning, the new building will include a small storefront to help students apply learnings related to quality control, product pricing and placement (displays), marketing and promotion, develop or access markets / networks for their wares and create incubation funds for their businesses without significant rent or other overhead expenses. Furthermore, as a government-accredited vocational training facility, certification from The School of Purpose will further bring dignity, validation and credibility to the graduates who will be issued a government-recognized certificate and, as a result, will have greater and higher quality employment or entrepreneurship opportunities. Acts of Grace funds will be used to fund the construction of the School of Purpose.
Pictured here: Young women learn to cook, bake and other culinary skills like catering.
Grant Year: 2019
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Children with hearing difficulties face significant barriers due to a lack of understanding in the Congolese culture, which often perceives deaf as unintelligent and worthless. The Ephphata School for the Deaf brings love, hope and freedom to over 250 vulnerable children and their families in an accepting, Christ-centred environment that teaches skills for a productive, fulfilling life.
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Ephphata School is subject to the limited infrastructure of the DRC which provides only inconsistent and weak electricity. In 2018, a solar panel was installed to provide power for most of the school, but did not cover the carpentry workshop which is still powered by an old, inefficient, and costly generator. This results in students receiving insufficient training.
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Reliable and significant power from the new solar panel will transform Ephphata’s amateur carpentry workshop into a professional training centre including higher grade tools and machinery. With these upgrades, Ephphata School will be able to more effectively prepare students for self-sufficient independence by dramatically enhancing their carpentry skills to meet the highest professional standards. The new solar panel and enhanced training will also support the school’s long-term sustainability by enabling income-generating activities such as the production and sale of milled lumber and high-end furniture.
Grant Years: 2023-2025
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Wellspring will be a catalyst for transforming education and fostering vibrant communities that address overty in all its forms. Wellspring seeks justice, worth and dignity for all those with whom it engages showing the love of Christ and empowering new generations through quality education in Africa. Through locally relevant, sustainable, and scalable models, Wellspring empowers Rwandan parents, teachers, school and community leaders, as well as local and national government officials with training, coaching, research and advocacy to ensure Rwandan children have access to exceptional learning experiences in inclusive, engaging, playful, adaptive and character-building classrooms; nurturing healthy home environments that support holistic growth and learning and the necessary tools, knowledge and life skills for emotional resilience, well-being and good mental health. Children who come to school from a nurturing, safe, and stimulating home are ready to learn, socialize and self-regulate. If family life is fractured by conflict and violence, if parents lack knowledge about healthy child development, if communication patterns are hurtful or if children are neglected, they don’t have the capacity to learn at school, and their future is at risk.
Pictured here: Rwandan girls and boys learn together in a classroom.
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At Wellspring's 2022 Healthy Families workshop, parents shared painful stories of family violence, marriage breakdown, and childrearing challenges, including neglect, mistreatment and conflict. As a result of cultural norms and the 1994 genocide, parents lack role models and generalized society-based learning to develop positive parenting skills. Many Rwandan parents do not have adequate sexual and reproductive health education, gender bias means girls bear a disproportionate level of responsibilities at home, children have poor nutrition, and marriages are failing. Rwanda's 2023 National Strategy to Address Drop Out cites family conflict being a key cause of school absenteeism, especially for girls. Parents need knowledge and skills to contribute positively to the holistic development of their children so they can learn and thrive. This pilot project will test a model to equip and empower 360 village-level "Community Influencers" with practical knowledge and skills to strengthen family relationships.
Pictured here: Rwandan parents participate in Wellspring's "Life in Families" training in Rubavu, Rwanda.
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Community Influencer training be facilitated by Wellspring's social workers and will provide knowledge and skills in the areas of improved conflict resolution, healthy communication, child development, positive discipline, gender equality, mental well-being, and more. Each of the Community Influencers will, in turn, invest in supporting 20 people (10+ families) in their village, extending the project reach of 7200 individuals. This project will result in healthier marriages and flourishing families that provide safer and more developmentally and emotionally supportive homes for girls and boys leading to more consistent school attendance and a greater capacity for children to learn. Funding from Acts of Grace will provide 100% of the resources needed for all foundational stages of the project, including a collaborative and participant-driven approach to project design, the creation of all training materials and methods suited to the local context and the development of robust monitoring and evaluation processes with clear outcomes and indicators of impact.
Pictured here: Community members participate in Wellspring training in a village in Rwanda.
