Mabuchi N. Dokowe is one of 14 International Peacemakers coming to the U.S. this fall
by Rich Copley | Presbyterian News Service
Mabuchi N. Dokowe
LOUISVILLE — Mabuchi N. Dokowe has 6,204 children.
Four of them are her own she is raising with her husband in Lusaka, the capital and largest city in Zambia. The other 6,200 are students in 32 community schools in the southern African nation that she oversees as the director of community schools for vulnerable and marginalized children for the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (CCAP), Synod of Zambia.
“We formed community schools to capture vulnerable and marginalized children who cannot afford to get into government or private schools,” Dokowe writes.
It is a job with significant challenges including, “poverty, high level of unemployment, HIV and AIDS, poor sanitation and no proper health facilities,” Dokowe writes. At some schools they have dug boreholes to access clean water. Some have community health centers to help their underserved communities.
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has helped the schools’ efforts through financial, transportation and human resources, Dokowe says. This September and October, she will be traveling to the United States as one of the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program’s 14 International Peacemakers.
Peacemakers are available to visit around the country from Sept. 13 to Oct. 7. Visits are coordinated with mid councils (synods and presbyteries) and can include appearances in churches, seminaries, colleges, universities and similar institutions. Visits generally last three to five days, but they can be extended as needed.
Click here for the application to invite a Peacemaker
Dokowe says she is coming to teach and learn. During her stay, she hopes to gain insight from her fellow peacemakers and from people she meets across the country. But given the scope and depth of the work she has to do in Zambia, there’s a lot that Americans and fellow Peacemakers can learn from Dokowe.
Like any teacher, Dokowe’s success can be seen in where former students of the schools she helps lead are now.
Answering questions submitted to her by the Peacemaking Program, she writes that the schools she works with have a “98% pass rate during the national assessment examinations … Some of these children are attending colleges and university.
“This is an encouragement to the community resulting in more enrolment to our schools.”
Click here to give to the International Peacemakers program.
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