Before leaving for Egypt, I received the email below from Jessie Maughan. Her mother and aunt have been a great help with our Utah Valley Days for Girls Chapter.  I am happy to report that this week we sent 150 beautiful kits to Jessie to distribute to the girls and women in the Buvuma Islands.  We look forward to hearing about how they are received.

Ann,

My name is Jessie Maughan. I am working as a country director in Uganda this summer for an Nonprofit called HELP International. We are working on a number of community projects including those related to education and public health. 

My home ward in Provo worked on the Days for Girls reuasable menstrual pads earlier this year. The reason I wanted to contact you was to see about the possibility of getting some supplies to Uganda in July. We are working on an outreach in some remote Islands here (the Buvuma Islands) where the poverty level is very high, access to electricity and clean water is very scarce. Our partnering organization recently told us that one of the greatest needs on the island is doing something with reuasable menstrual pads and educating the girls in that area.They asked if we could come prepared with supplies for 200 girls. We do have a pattern for teaching the girls using supplies here in Uganda, however, the supplies are limited here. If sending the kits here is not a feasible option, we will certainly do our best with what is available here. 

We have a volunteer who will be traveling from Provo on July 2nd and coming out here to join us. I was going to check with you first to see if there was a way to get some of the pads and have her bring them or what I needed to do to make some arrangements. I would be more than happy to setup a time to Skype with you and discuss the options. 

Thank you,

—

Jessie Maughan

Brigham Young University

Master of Public Administration, Class of 2015

 I also took several kits to Egypt which will end up on the island of Mauritius this week.  It’s very exciting to see the work spreading out from our own Utah Valley all over the world.  In the last 8 months, we will have made and sent out more than 3000 kits to 8 different countries.  Thanks to all of you who are helping and sharing and working so hard.  I wish everyone could see the joy in the faces of those on the receiving end.