Growing up with single parents was not easy. Despite us having great higher education, our parents were poor and struggled to provide for our basic needs including school products. For example, when my father passed away, mother and I together with my siblings moved from the city to the village where the closest elementary school was about 16 miles away.  One day, in my first grade, I was walking back from school with friends and we decided to stop by the river to cool off.  On our way to the village that evening, I realized I had lost my pencil.  I was so afraid to face my mother because I knew how much she would whip me.  It was such a relief when the next morning on my way to school I found that pencil by the riverbank.

When we moved to the United States of America, I noticed that the Dollar stores here sold 20 pencils for One dollar.  This was very exciting to me.  With our minimal income, we decided to begin buying pencils and sending those to rural schools in Zambia.  As time went by and our income improved, we started adding pens, books, toothbrushes & toothpaste, underwear, socks and used clothes plus more.  

As the boxes became bigger and shipping became expensive, we started talking on how we could maximize our efforts.  We agreed we could build a school – Oliver said not just a school but a medical hospital, a tropical disease research center and an Ivy League