How Beats and Books is changing lives of youngsters in the ghetto

Imagine a day in the ghetto; where the talent is raw and the music lyrics are deep and the dance strokes are fluid. The ghetto in its glory where the smiles are authentic. Imagine your squad sharing the dance floor with these young superstars.

Imagine having all that fun, but for the good cause of creating awareness about the low literacy development levels of the country.

Beats and Books in the Ghetto has been making a difference  by changing the lives of many youngsters in  this way . Beats and Books in the Ghetto is a concept by Read to Learn Foundation that enables revellers to have fun while inspiring the children of the ghetto, atop distributing learning materials to them.

It is a fun 3-hour experience where you and your squad visit a ghetto, deliver baskets filled with books, food support and anything of your choice.

As part of the experience, one engages in comical spelling bees and fun read aloud sessions with our literacy champions in these areas.

Founded in 2017 by Mago Hasfa, Book drive -Read to Learn Foundation is an indigenous Ugandan women-led nonprofit organization focused on early literacy development with an emphasis on the creation of community-driven and led interventions.

It focuses on addressing barriers that hinder access to appropriate and relatable reading and learning materials while also addressing the social, economic, and cultural aspects.

Using child-friendly modes, effective and innovative interventions, and community engagement.

As part of the community engagement model, the foundation conducts annual campaigns of drawing happiness from festival celebrations to ghetto families where we partner with individuals, communities, companies to extend fun and literacy tools plus food stuff to these communities with the aim of reaching out to families.

Some of the objectives include reaching out to ghetto children and bringing a smile on their faces for Christmas, honing the literacy and numeracy skills of children through awarding them reading materials.

Other objectives are to engage communities that are neighbouring ghetto communities to develop and contribute towards the development wellbeing of children and engaging the youth from the slum communities to keep them occupied. This will keep the youth from engaging in radical activities.

Slums are well known impoverished and densely populated communities found in cities.

For Kampala city, these communities accommodate a big number of people including children. Living conditions in these communities are evidently difficult and Individuals and families unable to meet their basic needs like food, clean drinking water and education.

Also, this has come with challenges which hinder the learning of young people especially those in pre-primary and primary schools because parents struggle to meet all the basic needs of children hence ignoring learning.

This has affected the learning process of young learners especially those in lower classes. Due to the above-mentioned challenges, when it comes to festival events and internationally celebrated days like Christmas, many families from these communities do not celebrate them.

For over five years, Book Drive Read to learn foundation has worked with the communities of Kampala especially in slums of Katanga, neighbouring Wandegeya, Nabweru and Nsambya, a refugee host community.

These communities are characterised by poor lifestyles and lack of basic needs like food, education and shelter. This has caused them to live a miserable and hopeless life.