Ekisa Ministries International
Rewriting the story of disability
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Residential Care
Ekisa's residential program involves running a transitional home that is currently housing 16 children with mild to severe physical and intellectual disabilities. As we see this program as a transitional home, our social workers are constantly working to find these children homes in the form of resettlement or domestic adoption; we feel strongly that children belong in families and not in institutions. In addition to meeting the children's basic needs while they are with us, we also employ four nurses, two physiotherapists, one Occupational Therapist, and one Speech and Language Therapist. The children also receive a specialized education in an adapted learning environment to suit their level of cognitive ability. School activities include access to a multi-sensory room, lesson plans that teach the children at their skill level and cover a multitude of subjects, such as phonics, math, reading, writing, fine and gross motor skills, music and physical education, and relevant and practical life-skills.
Community Care Outreach Program
Apart from the residential program, we also have a Community Care Outreach Program that helps to empower and advocate for about 100 families in the community who have a child with special needs. In some cases, this involves access to our team of therapists and being a part of a support group comprised of other Community Care families. For the more severe cases, we offer transport to medical appointments and provide seizure medications, and in some cases, financial assistance towards more substantial medical expenses.
Ekisa Academy
The school program offers specialized education and was previously only offered to the children in the Residential Program. The school has now expanded to include spaces for as many children in our Community Care Outreach Program as possible. Services include physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech and language therapy, access to the multi-sensory room, skill level appropriate lessons covering a multitude of subjects (eg. phonics, math, reading, writing, fine and gross motor skills, music and physical education), and the teaching of relevant and practical life-skills.
Where we work
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Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
The goal of Ekisa Ministries is two-fold: first, we aim to provide the best care for the children in our residential program and to find families for each child that will love and care for them; secondly, we aim to promote and provide support in the prevention of children, specifically children with disabilities, being placed in orphanages.
The main objective of the Community Care Outreach Program and the School Program are to empower and support families with a child with special needs so that they do not reach a point of desperation and chose to abandon their child.
The other component of prevention is education. The families in our CCO Program receive training and teaching about the care of their child, and also about the cause and physiology of disability. The purpose of this is to reverse the deep seeded belief that disabilities are the cause of curses or other superstitions and to eliminate the shame that goes along with those beliefs.
Finally, whenever possible, we choose to fill positions within our organization with individuals living with disabilities in our community who might not otherwise be able to find suitable work.
We are working hard in all these things in order that we might begin to change the perception of the community at large and reduce the stigma towards disability in general. It is our desire to impact the community in such a way that people begin to see that individuals with disabilities have just as much value as those that do not.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
In addition to support, counseling and physiotherapy being available at the home for our community care families, we have recently started operating Community Outreach and Rehabilitative Empowerment (CORE) groups in districts outside of the area we operate in. As transport can be expensive and travelling with a child with disabilities can be challenging, we wanted to provide the same services to those families that are unable to come to us. One of our physiotherapists and one of our social workers attend these groups, which are currently operating once a week at two different locations.
One program that is currently in the planning phase is the Respite Care Program. The Respite Care Program would help to further reduce the strain on our community care families by having scheduled times where their child spends one to two days at Ekisa, providing respite for the care takers.
Other strategies were outlined in the "Goals" section.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Ekisa employees a staff of 12 social workers, and 7 therapists which work towards accomplishing our organizational goals within each of our programs. A large percentage of our annual budget is spent on our Community Care Program and the work of our social workers.
Our residential program resides in a building that has been modified to meet the needs of the children in our care. A large staff of care takers and nurses provides exceptional care to all of the children residing at Ekisa.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
- 140 total in our Community Care outreach program across two service locations (Jinja and Iganga)
- 9 Resettlements
- 2 Domestic Adoptions
- 4 Foster Care Placements
- 6 International Adoptions
- Ekisa Academy, our dedicated special education school, opened February 2015 with a half-day school program and expanded to a full-day program in February 2019
- the Training and Equipping Department was opened in 2020 to help organizations effectively support children with disability as well as assist Ugandan children’s homes and orphanages with the tools, know-how and support to safely reunify children and transition to family care with the goal of reaching and placing more children in families by walking alongside organizations and providing them with transition and disability support services
- opened a second Community Care outreach centre in a neighbouring town in March 2021 with 55 families enrolled
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
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Ekisa Ministries International
Board of directorsas of 10/13/2021
Matt Mooney
Phil Worrall
Cilla Crane
Jeremy Mack
Matt Mooney
Will Rogers
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? GuideStar partnered on this section with CHANGE Philanthropy and Equity in the Center.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
No data
Gender identity
No data
No data
Sexual orientation
No data
Disability
No data