Cornerstone Veritas Internship Graduation

A Family of Friends!

Hooray, hooray to all our interns of 2013!. We came a long way right from the beginning to this year to this month (August). Cornerstone Veritas appreciates all the time, energies and the contributions that they made towards the advancement and success of our internship program. This was the second group of Cornerstone Veritas to have graduate successfully, with the first graduating in 2012. It is our pleasure to note that this year was even better. We had many other sub programs added to our internship program.

 Lawrence, Edmond and Kizito.

Our intern graduation successfully took place on Saturday, August 3^rd     at K.K beach, a suburb south East of Kampala. It was great seeing  Alfred Elalu Edakasi the C.V patron together with Michael Eluku join us for the event.

The day was so exciting. We played a number of games as well as went on a boat ride on Lake Victoria. It was great fun!

Jovia receives her envelope from Alfred

 A bboat ride into Lake victoria Islands

 Kizito doing his thing...

Thanks to Noelle,and  Frank, among others who worked so tirelessly and came up with new additions to our internship program. We also appreciate all those who support our work in the different ways, be it financially, morally or spiritual support.

Background of this internship program:

This program lasts for 8 months, from January to August of every internship year. Participants are students who have graduated from the Cornerstone Leadership academies (Cornerstone Leadership Academy boys, Cornerstone Leadership Academy girls and Ekitangala Transformation High school)

Cissy and Perepetua during a game.

 We enjoyed a boat ride too.

A range of skills are imparted to these young people including improved reading, writing, time management, communication, teaching, financial management/accountability, networking computer and emailing skills. Personal discovery and exploration of individual skills and talents and abilities are some of the programs the interns also learned.

This year’s Graduation experience:

 Interns pause for a photo with Alfred

This year’s graduation was wonderful. With Kizito in the group, fun was assured. It is interesting how he easily drove the rest of the group into hearty laughter. He easily put smiles on everybody’s face with his comic stunts. Alfred Edakasi joined as later in the afternoon alongside Michael Eluku.

We also played many games such as beach volleyball, football, and bucket filling. Swimming and a boat ride spiced up the day.

 Jovia, Frank and Perepetua

 Patricia leads the rest in a photo shoot

Alfred (the C.V patron) had a session through which he encouraged team spirit and continuous application of the principles, skills and values the interns learnt during internship. He reminds us the life is always an internship experience in the we are always learning more and more as time passes by.

 Alfred hands an envelop to Kizito (Intern)

Not to forget Noelle:

Lots of appreciation to Noelle from wherever you are! Her absence in this year’s graduation didn’t go unnoticed. She walked with us almost all the internship journey only to leave 2 months to its end. Never the less, we appreciate her for all the hard work and contribution that she was able to extend towards the success of this year’s internship program.We missed you Noelle Gornik !

 Swimming wasn't missed at all.

 Patricia, Perepetua and Jovia.

Intern Community Engagement Projects

Intern Community Engagement Projects

 Here we are again, greetings from Cornerstone Veritas! With a few days left for our interns to graduate, we would like to give you a glimpse of what our community engagement projects were like.

Cornerstone Veritas Community Engagement Projects are projects are aimed at giving our interns an opportunity to practically engage their local communities and empower them to use the leadership skills they have gained throughout their schooling and time in their internship. The process of carrying out the community engagement project is what is more important. When carrying out these projects, our interns target a specific age group in the community, and use these projects as a platform of engaging this population
.

This year, the Interns chose varied projects ranging from Maize farming, Market gardening (Cabbages), debating and Foot ball tournaments.  All of these projects were started as a requirement of their Cornerstone Veritas Internship program.  Below are details of what the projects are like:

Maze growing in the garden!

Maize farming project  
[Interns Kirabo Jovia and Katusabe  Perpetua]

 Perpetua & Jovia

Jovia and Perpetua chose to engage the desperate orphans in their area [Ekitangala Ranch] through Farming. From the time of planting, the group of orphans meet regularly with Jovia and Perpetua to weed and care for the plants.
   During these meetings, the orphans taught practical gardening skills as well as the principles of leadership. Jovia and Perpetua taught them principles sucha as commitment to excellence, success requires hard work, and resourcefulness.
   After harvest, part of the money earned will be divided among the orphans to provide some of their needs such as books, pens, sets pencils among others. The orphans really feel part of the project in the whole process.  Jovia and Perpetua have successfully met a need they saw in their community through hard work, team work, and resourcefulness!  

Market (Cabbage) Gardening             [Intern Kizito Jude Thaddeus]

 Kizito

This project has been the most successful. It is amazing that Kizito managed to connect with and empower five idle, notorious drug addicts in his neighborhood. All of them were disowned by their relatives and were just wondering about the village. Kizito has no brother or relatives to stays with, so he decided to invite the orphans to occupy one of the rooms in his small house. Every day they have time to work, pray and relax together. As a result, Kizito has been able to transform these Orphans both morally and spiritually to people now accepted and admired in the village. Even when Kizito leaves for university next month, his cabbage garden will continue with the help of these orphans.

The Debating Tournament                   [Intern Musinguzi Lawrence]  

 Lawrence

Lawrence has been doing his internship with C.V as well as mentoring at Cornerstone Leadership Academy for Boys at the Ekitanggela Ranch.  He wished to do an engagement project in his local village in Katooke. However, due to the distance, he finally decided to organize a debate tournament between the care groups at CLA. The finals are yet to be organized later next month. Right now inter group debates are still going on. During this program, Lawrence is taking the young men through learning how to debate, focusing on improving their English, and helping them to learn to put together their thoughts properly.  

A Popcorn making business                    [Intern Nadongo Cissy]

 Cissy

Cissy has been working in a shop over the last 8 months.  She noticed that there was a market for popcorn among the local school children.  After considering this, she decided to start a popcorn making business as her community engagement project!  Cissy is still running her popcorn making business. She has gathered a group of children in her neighborhood with who she teached the precepts of Jesus and other important life lessons. She uses a portion of her profits to support that group as well as to buy some scholastic materials for the school children.

  

Football Tournament                             [Intern Odeke Emmanuel]

 Emma

Emma decided to do something unique for his project, a 3 day football tournament! During the three days of football and fun, the children from the different teams were also taken through some of the 10 principles of leadership and taught other basic life lessons!
   They love it.  Most of these children had been sneaking to watch movies in Cinema halls, they now they go to play football as teams in the northern suburbs of Soroti [Camp Swahili]. These teams will continue with the spirit of regularly meeting together and share inform of fellowships. It’s his prayer that this trend continues.

We are proud of the hard work and dedication of all of our interns!  We are incredibly pleased to see them putting into practice all of the skills they have learned.  Each of them truly have a heart for service of the least fortunate in their communities, and have done their best to engage and make a difference!

Please consider leaving a comment of encouragement for these fantastic young people!