Welcome to our monthly update on projects that have launched or will soon be launching at MATTER.
MATTER Innovation Hub
A new MATTER Innovation Hub (MIH) opened last week at the Conway Community Center in St. Paul, Minnesota. Our partner, The Sanneh Foundation, constructed and designed a special room specifically for MIH learning. As part of their after-school programming, this new “tech center” will offer children a creative, hands-on, student-centered approach to learning coding and technology. As children explored the new space during the grand opening celebration, it didn’t take them long to begin designing pictures, playing games and moving a spherical ball around the room – all from the iPads in their hands! Watching the kids’ eyes light up when they learned a new coding skill, Sanneh Foundation CEO, Tony Sanneh, couldn’t help but smile. “We’re so happy to be able to focus on STEM learning through a partnership with MATTER, Comcast and others, so that kids have a place to access technology and learn.”
Hospitals and Clinics
This month, Daystar University in Nairobi, Kenya, welcomed a container of medical equipment and supplies from MATTER to equip their nursing school. Included in the shipment were fetal heart monitors, defibrillators, surgical beds, laparotomy sets, and manikins; as well as bedside tables, laundry trolleys, crash carts and even mattresses. The equipment will help the University provide the very best training to the country’s future nurses. From the University: “We are so grateful to God and to MATTER for the equipment! There are currently 474 students in the Daystar Nursing School, 47 at the Nairobi campus (which has a skills lab from the MATTER shipment in 2018, and 427 at the Athi River campus. The shipment of equipment will be for these students.”
Chaya
As part of the second phase of The Chaya Tree Project, Noah Elhardt who oversees the agriculture training at The Beer-Sheba Project in Senegal is holding three training workshops in Zimbabwe this week alongside Silent Kaseke who manages the twelve Chaya sites around Zimbabwe. 32 women co-op farmers attended the first training to learn how to incorporate Chaya into their family’s diets. Noah was pleased with the response from the women. “They were very excited. Many of them took Chaya leaves home to dry. They were eager to cook them and vowed there would be no obstacles that would keep them from integrating Chaya into their diets.”
MATTERbox
In honor of National Volunteer Month, Discover held an employee volunteer packing event on April 20. Over 1,100 of their national employees packed 28,750 healthy MATTERbox snack packs for communities across the country! Using MATTERbox Volunteer Kits, employees assembled the snack packs in their homes and were encouraged to donate them to local community organizations of their choice. This is the largest employee packing event using MATTERbox Volunteer Kits to date. Thank you, Discover, for partnering with MATTER to give back to communities nationwide!
MATTER Pro
We’re excited to announce the re-launch of the Luol Deng Foundation website! MATTER Pro partner, Luol Deng, retired from the NBA in 2019 after an illustrious 15-year career that included ten years with the Chicago Bulls, two NBA All-Star titles and numerous accolades on and off the court. Born in South Sudan, Luol and his family were forced to flee when Luol was still a young boy. Though he grew up in the U.K., his home country of South Sudan was never far from his mind. Establishing his foundation in 2005, Luol’s been able to impact his country in some pretty incredible ways. And he has no plans of stopping any time soon! Check out the new and improved Luol Deng Foundation website to learn more about the life-changing work our MATTER Pro partner is doing in South Sudan and around the world.
