Our catering students are baking and cooking so many appetizing and mouthwatering desserts and main courses during each class period. Their instructor gives them different recipes to try including many Liberian favorites (such as Jollof Rice) while also giving them well-known comfort food recipes (such as pizza).
They recently made their first pizza from scratch by mixing the ingredients for the dough and rolling out the crust into a circle. Then they topped the crust with pizza sauce, meat, and cheese before it was placed in the oven. As it baked in the oven, the center filled with a pleasing aroma. Our catering students served their pizza to Kelvin Fomba (Co-Founder & Director) and Godfrey Solomon (Registrar & Artist) to do the taste test. Kelvin and Godfrey gave raving reviews to our students.
Your catering students celebrating the success of their first pizza, Godfrey (middle photo) enjoying his slice, and Kelvin (right photo) savoring his.
If your travels bring you to Liberia, we hope you will visit our center. Our catering students would love to make and serve you something savory and yummy because you are making it possible for them to learn this trade. Thank you!
How often were you asked this question when you were applying for your first job? There are some people not willing to give a young person a chance, but you have made a commitment to provide Liberian Youth with the experience they need to demonstrate what they know. Your continued investment is not only giving them the materials, equipment, and tools to learn a trade career but also allowing them a chance to go into the field and apply their skills.
Our committed and dedicated instructors are constantly looking for opportunities to give our students real experience. Two weeks ago, Emmanuel Somah (plumbing instructor) received a contract to install the pipes in a new home being built outside of Monrovia. Our students laid the pipes in two bathrooms and the kitchen. They will return in a few weeks to build the septic tank and install the fixtures.
Your students installing pipes for a new home.
Your support made it possible for young men and a woman to gain valuable experience by applying their skills in a real home and be compensated for their efforts. It is important to teach our students that their work has worth.
Your students applying their skills with installing pipes 2 bathrooms & kitchen.
We hope that more people will give our students a chance to demonstrate their abilities by awarding contracts to our institution. Through your generous giving, you helped build our learning labs where our students practice their skills during each class period. This is why they are eager and ready to do the work in any setting to achieve the experience needed to be hired.
Your students received real experience and now admire their work.
Your continued support of Liberian Youth is changing their lives for the better. You may not fully appreciate your impact, but what you have accomplished in helping these ambitious young men and women gain marketable skills at our training center is paramount to their success.
On Saturday, October 13, 2018, the Honorable Jackson George, Consul General, Liberian Consulate of Minnesota, attended our board meeting to share his experiences and observations while visiting our center in July. He conveyed to our board members and volunteers participating in person or on Google Hangout how much we are doing on very little. He shared:
1) How impressed he was with our students and their hunger to learn.
2) An explanation of how the current economic situation makes life challenging:
With an unemployment rate of about 85%, it is challenging for young people to find work, so the work of UDS is instrumental in the students finding employment or entrepreneurship.
UDS graduates are more prepared to be ready to work than young people graduating from Liberian universities due to the practical application training they receive.
3) A pledge to assist in promoting the work of UDS with Liberian government authorities and other agencies where collaboration can help strengthen our programs.
And you have made this possible through your investment in their training, ultimately leading to their success!
Left to right: Adam Pederson, Board Secretary; Diane Anastos, Board Treasurer; Miriam Monono Issac, Board Member; Jackson George, Consul General; Beyan Gonowolo, Board Member; & Mary Rosendahl, Board Member. Two volunteers: Sonal Suri and Melissa Meach joined by Google Hangout.
You are cordially invited to a Dinner & Movie Fundraising organized by Tashie George, owner of IfriMart. This is your time to stay up late, eat delicious Liberian Cuisine, and watch a compelling movie as daylight savings occurs overnight.
The featured movie is Out of My Hand (PG-13): a film about “a struggling Liberian rubber plantation worker risks everything to discover a new life as a Yellow Cab driver in New York City.” The film is directed by Takeshi Fukunaga, and the leading role is played by Bishop Blay.
The dinner will be prepared by Taste of Africa with Jollof Rice (popular one-pot dish), potato salad, fufu (like a dumpling), soup, chicken, ginger beer, donuts, and cornbread.
The program will highlight the work Uniting Distant Stars is doing to support young men and women in Liberia as they receive valuable vocational training in our center.
Do you remember when Abel Kabba (Plumbing Student) said, “Thank you very much for doing great things that you aren’t even noticing“? It is hard to convey in our newsletters how much you are doing to help young men and women in Liberia receive quality training at our center. You are providing the necessary resources to make this possible. You are buying the practical materials, equipment, and tools to apply what they are learning in their respective courses. You are ensuring these students will graduate next year prepared and ready to start working immediately in their given trade.
Our cosmetology students are an example of how “practice makes perfect.” Each class they find their own clients and apply the many different styles of braids. This is called plaiting hair and is a unique art-form because it can take several hours of weaving their real hair with extensions. These type of hairstyles protect the ends of the hair and decrease tangling, breaking and shedding.
Your investment in our students allows them to perfect their craft. Photos by Roseline Sonday, Instructor
You can see your students are focused and detail-oriented while plaiting their client’s hair. Photos by Roseline Sonday, Instructor
