About Us
“Tuwapende Watoto” in Kiswahili means “we love children.”
The Tuwapende Watoto Children’s Foundation is a charity in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. It provides orphaned and abandoned children a loving home and a good long term education for their future.
Tuwapende Watoto is a politically and religiously independent organization.
The Foundation is officially registered as an NGO in Tanzania. It is funded through private and institutional donations. The largest part of the administrative work is done by volunteers in Switzerland. All travel expenses of the founding members and the ambassadors as well as of the volunteers are paid by the persons privately. We guarantee that almost 100% of the donations are used locally.
Short history
2006
Since 2006, the foundation has been running a children’s home with currently 29 children aged between 3 and 24 years. In 2010 it opened a nursery (Kindergarten) and one year later a primary school.
In January 2016, a day care was added.
Currently, around 800 pupils attend the Tuwapende Watoto Nursery and Primary School.
2016
In 2016 we realized the first step of the vocational training centre with the construction of the first two school buildings, the toilet facilities and the gatehouse.
In 2017, we taught two vocational school classes for tailors, one class for bakers and two classes for gardeners in the six classrooms. In summer 2017, we built the third building with three classrooms and were able to hand over three more classrooms to the company in January 2018. In 2020 and 2022, two more buildings with 4 classrooms each (including a multi-purpose room) could be put into operation.
Currently, 140 learners are completing a two-year apprenticeship in 10 professions in the dual education system. The professions offered are tailor, baker, gardener, electrician, electronics technician, computer scientist, plumber, bicycle mechanic and hairdresser/beauty.