Measuring What Matters

Before AMJAD came to our village, I watched my children go to bed hungry during the dry season. The agricultural training changed everything. I learned to grow cassava, sweet potatoes, and leafy vegetables year-round using improved seedlings and proper soil care. Today I sell surplus at the Makeni market every Saturday. My three children are all in school. I never imagined this life was possible for a widow like me.

I dropped out of school at fourteen because my family could not afford the fees. I thought my future was already decided. Then AMJAD's vocational program accepted me. I trained in masonry for eight months — the instructors treated us with respect and pushed us to be excellent. I have now built walls for six homes in my community and I employ two younger men from my neighborhood. AMJAD did not just give me a skill. They gave me back my dignity.

When I arrived in the United States I did not know where to turn. I had no family here, no job, and very little English. AMJAD's outreach team found me through a community center and walked with me through every step — housing, documentation, job training, and connecting me to a Sierra Leonean community I could belong to. Three years later I am a certified nursing assistant and I send money home to my mother in Freetown every month. I owe so much to this organization.

Our chiefdom had no clean water source within two kilometers. Women and girls walked that distance twice a day, which meant girls missed school and women could not tend their farms in the morning. AMJAD listened to us — truly listened — and worked with our community to construct a borehole at the center of the village. That single change has transformed daily life for more than three hundred families. Our girls are in school. Our women are farming. We are moving forward.

I was told many times that a girl from my village had no business dreaming of university. AMJAD's education sponsorship paid my secondary school fees when my father lost his job. The program also gave me a mentor — a woman who had grown up in a village like mine and become a teacher. She showed me what was possible. I passed my WASSCE exams and I am now studying public health at Njala University. I will come back and serve my community. That is my promise.

Our church has partnered with AMJAD for several years now, and what sets them apart is their integrity. They do not make promises they cannot keep. They show up, they work alongside the community, and they leave people stronger than they found them. We have jointly supported trauma healing workshops, food distribution during the lean season, and youth mentorship programs. Every collaboration has been marked by professionalism, humility, and genuine care for the people they serve.