If you know me then you know that this will be a real challenge for me! I have put some information about the charity below so you are able to see what you are donating for, I really hope you will feel this is a worthy cause and will put whatever you can afford towards it. Thank you so so much in advance!

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Southern African Scholarship Fund

The Southern African Scholarship Fund is a charity set up by the University of Brighton Students’ Union in 1987–88 to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the death of Steve Biko, a political activist and former leader of the Southern African Students Association who died in police custody under the Apartheid regime in South Africa. Although, the first multiracial elections in 1994 brought an end to apartheid and ushered in majority rule under an African National Congress (ANC)-led government, South Africa still struggles to address apartheid-era imbalances in decent housing, education and health care.

Aims
The Southern African Scholarship Fund aims to help the development of South Africa and its neighbouring countries by funding southern African scholars on courses which directly benefit the wider community when they return home. To date, the fund has supported trainee teachers, engineers, doctors and nurses. Your support will help provide a postgraduate scholarship to a student from South Africa, Namibia, Swaziland, Botswana, Zambia, Mozambique or Angola.

Impact
The scholarship has recently been supporting medical students and nurses from Zambia. Like most of southern Africa, Zambia suffered extensive destruction during the apartheid South Africa-backed regional destabilisation war of the 1970s and 1980s. Also in common with most of the southern region, Zambia has HIV/AIDS prevalence rates that are among the highest in the world, standing at about 14.3 per cent to 15.2 per cent. About 80 per cent of Zambians depend on farming, although only seven per cent of the land is arable. Most live below the ‘extreme poverty line’ of less than $1 a day.

Two Zambian nurse educators attended a three-month critical care module at the university in 2009 and subsequently developed an Intensive Care course which they are now teaching at the Lusaka Nursing School to 20 nurses a year from Zambia. This small but effective initiative will ensure that where there was only one intensive care nurse in a country of nearly 12 million people, now there are nurses all over Zambia specialising in this important area of nursing. So you can see how the money raised ensures real positive changes to those who need it most.

How it works
The fund offers scholarships through the existing relationships university departments have with Southern African universities. The university gives fee waivers on courses and free accommodation for scholars. The fund covers all logistical costs including flights, food, living expenses and a clothing budget for the different climate. The University of Brighton Students’ Union are responsible for meeting and supporting the scholars during their stay.