Oruchinga
Refugee Settlement

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a United Nations program dedicated to protecting refugees who are forcibly displaced and assist in their local integration or resettlement to another country. UNHCR works to ensure that everybody has the right to find safe refuge and seek asylum, regardless of whether they have fled persecution, war, violence, or disaster in their home.

As an operational parter of UNHCR Uganda, MindLeaps is operating a program in Oruchinga Refugee Settlement in Uganda. MindLeaps has been given access to refugee settlements due to a partnership with the Office of the Prime Minister with a memorandum of understanding. In 2019, MindLeaps deployed a team to teach MindLeaps dance classes to refugee children as well as train refugee youth living in the settlement to become MindLeaps dance trainers through Train The Trainer programs. Every three months, MindLeaps teachers reach 150 new children through dance classes – taught 3 days per week, 2 hours each class. At the end of the three months, these children are sponsored into day school or vocational training in the settlement. As of 2021, 280 children are being sponsored by MindLeaps in formal education.

To do this, MindLeaps has developed a model centered on the training and support of local youth to carry the program forward. Since 2018, MindLeaps has been identifying older youth from existing dance groups as potential trainers. They participate in MindLeaps’ Train the Trainer program run by the international team over three months. Each of these participants receives 120 hours of training to be prepared to teach children according to the MindLeaps methodology. Participants study the standardized curriculum and learn how to use Tracker, the software application to collect data documenting change in critical learning skills. From this group, MindLeaps provides employment contracts to the top participants to become trainers working permanently for MindLeaps in Uganda.

As of 2020, MindLeaps had hired 8 youth certified through the Train The Trainer to sustain the program, reaching 450 children. During Covid-19, MindLeaps Uganda distributed $5,000 worth of food and sanitation supplies to our students and their families, and continued making home visits to check on the well-being of our students.

Through their involvement in the MindLeaps program, youth are making better life decisions and finding a productive path to improve their lives in a foreign country. As the mother of one refugee child said, “I have never seen my daughter smiling so much. She is so confident. God bless this program.”