Our beloved Eswatini is in crisis! Already dubbed the “The fatherless nation”, the fight is on for the soul of a country. Like the rest of the world, the health of families determines the way we love, serve, behave, and build communities. The foundations of who we are as a person is formed in the developing years by family. The need to take the fight to impact Eswatini to the next level is crucial.
Strengthening families and equipping leaders of communities through practical trainings, innovation and appropriate technologies is the next step for holistic transformation. Take our hand in pioneering the fight for many nations that will be impacted by Umdoni.
As students overcome the character-defining challenges of Year 1, they’re then exposed to a wide variety of trades and skillsets. As they learn life skills in plumbing, sewing, electrical, information technology, welding, and construction, they discover hidden talents and passions. They learn who they are and what they were made for.
The basic Year 1 dorm environment plunges students into a rapid live-in education covering advanced sustainability topics including waste and sewage management, livestock care, recycling, water storage techniques, agriculture, and permaculture to survive. The daily practice of budgeting, auditing, and critical thinking is automatic through this intentionally restricted basic living experience.
Year 1 is our largest year as we merge Umdoni students with SLA shepherds training.
Our recently installed 86,000-liter water reservoir helps us supply fresh drinking water to all of the vital buildings and housing areas using gravity instead of pumps!
Umdoni’s land was purchased in 2018. We let the ground lay fallow for a year and welcomed our first students in 2020 during the start of the pandemic.
Our water tower and high-pressure water systems were successfully fundraised and installed in 2020/2021. Medium-pressure and low-pressure systems remain to be installed per site as needed.
Umdoni features several private guest houses for guests, trainers, and volunteers. In the future, there will be more additions so that Umdoni can house teams.
Students and chaperones will live in one of three dormitories with integrated classroom spaces. These spaces will be highly integrated with kitchen gardens and food forests so that students can be as self-sufficient as possible.
We envision a multi-disciplinary workshop where students can learn sewing, electrical skills, woodworking, plumbing, welding, computing, and more. We’re calling the workshop “The Maker Space”
Business and hospitality centers function as areas to increase Umdoni’s ability to be sustainable while also providing a useful training ground for students and alumni.
We expect to have a restaurant, coffee shop, handicraft station, and more in the future.
We want to see Umdoni become an incubator of innovation to bring distributed change into our communities.
We believe we’ll achieve that by helping our students achieve whole life sustainability and encourage innovative thinking to solve the complex problem of poverty.
Through other programs, we’ll help strengthen families. We’ll equip leaders of communities through practical trainings, innovation and appropriate technologies is the next step for holistic transformation. Take our hand in pioneering the fight for many nations that will be impacted by Umdoni.
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