Dalton High School
Ujima: the HS Club and the Project.
By Katie H. (Dalton Class of ’07)
The Ujima Project is a community service and cultural awareness project, inspired by the example of the Kenyan freedom activist and Member of Parliament Koigi wa Wamwere. This project has manifested itself in the High school in the form of the Ujima Club and in the Middle School and First Program through their extremely active Human Rights clubs. Ujima (oo-JEE-ma) is a Swahili word that means living and working for one another. In the Ujima Club we try to work for our peers in Kenya through our fund-raising activities, and to work with them by forming strong and lasting bonds with each individual scholarship student. One way we achieve this is through our pen-pal system. Through this exchange of letters we have established an open discourse between students in Kenya and students at the Dalton School that allows us to learn about Kenyan culture on a more personal level. In the past the Ujima Club has also helped to spread awareness about Kenyan culture and the needs of students in Kenya by bringing speakers such as Peter Murimi, the 2004 CNN African Journalist of the Year, to speak to a HS assembly at the Dalton School.
One of our goals in Ujima Club in the High School, and in the Middle School and First Program, is to raise money for the Subukia Scholarship Fund, which provides students in Kenya with four-year high school scholarships. The scholarships are awarded on the basis of both merit and need. As of November 8 of this year the Dalton Community has raised $44,776.43 and we are currently funding the high school education of 21 students in the Subukia district of Kenya. With your help we hope to add more scholarships soon. Full accounting and monitoring for the Subukia Scholarship Fund are carried out through the offices of Getnick & Getnick, one of the nation’s leading law firms specializing in business integrity and corporate transparency, under the supervision of Neil Getnick, Dalton parent and the firm’s managing partner.
We have many plans for raising money and awareness during this school year and we hope you will take an interest in our club. For more information about Ujima, please visit our website at www.dalton.org/uji
