Secondary Education

Primary education in Malawi is free, but secondary education (the equivalent of high school in the U.S.) is not. Secondary school often becomes unaffordable for children whose parents are too sick to work or have died. There is a major shortage of working professionals in the medical field. The government of Malawi provides Anti-Retrovirals (ARV's) for free, but there are not enough nurses or doctors to administer these life-saving drugs. Education is the answer to this shortage. For $175 or $15 a month, you can send an orphan to secondary school for one year. This includes books, school supplies, uniform and shoes. Please click here to put a child through school.

Clean Water

Can you imagine a life without clean water? Unfortunately, many of the people in Malawi do not know what it's like to have this valuable resource at their disposal. Nearly four million people in Malawi do not have access to clean drinking water. Lack of safe drinking water is the second largest killer of children, and hinders education, health and economic development. Only 32% of the rural population of Malawi have access to water within less than a mile's walk. Women and children have been known to walk as far as five miles to get water.

During dry seasons (May-September) rivers dry up, increasing the formidable burden of fetching water, which can consume four hours a day or more. Poor sanitation increases the potential for deadly water-borne diseases. When given access to clean water, a village benefits in several ways:

When people have access to clean water, lives are transformed and quality of life is dramatically improved. Please help us provide clean water and save lives - donate now on our secure server.

Orphan Daycare Centers

There are over 1 million orphans in Malawi. These are children that have lost their parents to AIDS, malaria, or other diseases. The villages are comprised of tight-knit communities, so when parents die, it is naturally assumed that friends or relatives will care for their children. The communities have developed orphan pre-school daycare centers to give children the opportunity to start their education and receive two meals a day. Volunteers from the community serve at these centers, which each support up to 100 orphans. Equitas is currently supporting two of the centers, but we would like to support two more, and help to start a fifth one. We can feed a child and provide teaching supplies and training for volunteers from the community that care for the orphans for $50 a year. Please click here to support our orphan daycare program.