Growing, strengthening, and developing are all words that can be applied to our engagement in Nanuku. However, the best phrase is collaborative impact!

From the initial meeting in Nanuku, where we sat cross-legged on the floor, symbolically holding out our empty hands and asking God to fill our hands and hearts…to establishing a community vision and momentum of which we are just a part.

The last two Christmas seasons have been crime-free; that alone is so noteworthy we could end the update there. However, the ministry/early childhood centre continues progressing towards completion as willing hands, hearts, and funds are available, and our core activities continue to build impact.

The school lunch program provides more than a meal for the twenty-three registered children. As we celebrated the end of the school year, we also celebrated their increased school attendance and its flow-on impact on their class reports and grades. Twenty-two are registered again for 2025, with another ten on a waiting list. The collaborative effort is producing impact in young lives and altering pathways.

Another area of impact is the work with senior high school students. Seven senior students completed Form 7 with marks that have allowed them to pursue tertiary education. Over the summer break, Lisa Lovodua, our OF Community Development Team Leader, worked with twelve young people in Nanuku to prepare them for employment. The strategy outcomes were to;

Motivate them to make a change for themselves through constant communication and engagement.
Provide the assistance they needed in obtaining the paperwork, official documents and primary indentification’s, to make it easier for them to gain employment.
Give them some background on how the interview processes might go by doing mock interviews and prepping for potential interview questions, and dress codes for interviews.

The result is eight of the twelve have found employment, two are preparing for interviews, and another six youth have asked to participate.

Lisa writes that, ‘…because of this initiative, we have seen a huge increase in the confidence of the youth involved, with an improvement in the key relationships between OF and our single parent group and our youth. This employment preparation process has become a big encouragement to our youth leadership in the direction they want to take the rest of the youth of Nanuku this year.’

Operation Foundation is committed to the vision of restoring lives and restoring communities to the glory of God. Thank you for your collaborative support in bringing impact!