Community Message
Three thousand dollars. That is the full cost of sending a student to Abaarso for an entire year, covering tuition, housing, and meals, and the kind of opportunity that most of us never had to think twice about receiving. Many of us were born into families that could afford school, or into countries where the state simply provided it. That was not something we earned. The students at Abaarso have had none of those advantages, and yet they are competing at the highest levels in the world.
The numbers tell the story. Abaarso admits roughly one to two percent of its applicants, and last year, over 4,000 students competed for 40 spots. Students who arrive with little to no English leave four years later fluent, college-ready, and holding scholarship offers that Somaliland had not seen in over thirty years. Over 350 alumni have earned more than $55 million in scholarships, going on to careers at BlackRock, Goldman Sachs, the UN, the World Bank, and the government ministries of Somaliland. That is what beyond means.
The Abaarso Network is a cycle. A student from a village with almost no formal academic background can attend a Kaabe School, earn admission to Abaarso, graduate with university scholarships, and return home as a teacher, a government official, or a founder of the next institution in the network. The investment does not stop at one life. It compounds. Research shows that one educated person in a developing economy can support five to ten family members over a lifetime, meaning the reach of a single tuition payment extends far beyond the student it funds.
No overarching institution covers this gap. Somaliland lacks full international recognition, and most global systems simply do not operate there. Your support fills a space that governments and international organizations leave empty. Each dollar goes directly to the student. Because $3,000 funds a specific student for a specific year, you will be able to follow that student directly, watching them take their education and build a life that would not have been possible without you. With your help, it is our goal to have that student one day walk through the doors of the same universities many of us attended or hope to attend.
Every contribution is fully tax-deductible. But the more important truth is simpler than that: education is not a luxury. It is the one resource that, once given, cannot be taken away. The equation is straightforward: thousands of miles away, a student has spent years fighting for access to something most of the world takes for granted. All that remains is the chance to prove it. Three thousand dollars is all it takes to make the equation work, and a donor has already committed to match every dollar raised through this campaign. Fund one tuition, and two students get to outlive the odds they were born into. This message needs to reach further than it already has, and with your support, it will.
-Alexander and Caroline
Read more about Abaarso Network’s mission here.
All donations to Abaarso Network are tax-deductible via our US registered 501(c)(3) organization: Horn of Africa Education Development Fund (EIN: 20-7245709).
An Abaarso Network Donation Campaign Organized By:
Alexander Golden
Grade 11
Regis High School
I first encountered Abaarso at nine years old, watching the 60 Minutes segment with Anderson Cooper and Jonathan Starr. At the time, I understood it only in the dimmest terms, as a school somewhere far away doing something good. I had no real concept of college, no framework for what was at stake. But one line cut through. Speaking about the gang members who had threatened the school, Starr said, "I couldn't imagine there was life if I failed, and they were actually going to have to kill me and carry me out before he abandoned the students." I had never heard a man speak that way about anything. That was the moment Abaarso stopped being a story on a screen and became something I would not forget.
For years afterward, I watched from the sidelines as Abaarso grew. I think it is finally my time to step in. Regis is well known for its debate team, the Hearn, which I am not part of, but a recent topic asked whether Somaliland should be recognized by the African Union. The fact that the question was even on the floor told me something: more people knew about Abaarso than I had assumed, and where there is awareness, there is room for action.
Regis and Abaarso resemble each other in ways I find difficult to ignore. Both are test-optional, and both rest on the conviction that a student's potential should not be measured by his family's wealth. When I arrived at Regis, I paid nothing for the education I am now receiving. The more I sat with that fact, the more I understood how narrow the line was. Had my circumstances been different, had I been admitted but unable to pay, I would have been exactly where so many Abaarso students stand today. That is where this mission began. I want to fund at least one student's tuition, so that another boy can receive what I was given.
Caroline Woram
Grade 11
Kellenberg Memorial High School
A girl my age once refused to eat. She slept on the floor of her family's home with her face turned to the wall, refusing food for days, until her father finally agreed to let her attend the school she had always dreamed of. Her sacrifice opened a door for her younger sister Nadira, who followed her into Abaarso School and eventually earned a full scholarship to Yale. Nadira became the first Somali woman ever admitted to an Ivy League institution, giving Somaliland a face they could root for. I first read her story in Jonathan Starr's It Takes a School, and it changed the way I think about my own education. Her courage has stayed with me ever since.
In Somaliland, girls are frequently married off without consent and discouraged from academic ambition. According to the HALI Access Network, nearly half of all young Somali women are illiterate, and only 4 percent of secondary school teachers in the country are female. A girl exactly my age had to starve herself for the chance to learn, while I walked into school every morning without thinking about it once. Every woman deserves the right to an education, and when a young woman in Somaliland earns her degree, the norms of an entire community begin to shift.
The mission at Kellenberg, the call to be the hands and feet of God in the world, is something I hold close to my heart and believe our world increasingly needs. Many Abaarso students live without running water or electricity at home, and they work incredibly hard from early mornings to late nights to build a better life and create opportunities for themselves.
This is the change our world needs: to defend a girl's right to learn, and I am asking you to defend it with me. Tuition for one girl at Abaarso for a full year is a fraction of what most American families spend on a single semester of high school. It is the difference between a girl waking up to a forced wedding and a girl waking up to a life of her own. Please help me in my mission to raise tuition for one girl to attend Abaarso, because every girl deserves the chance to write her own story.
Give the gift of opportunity.
Make an impact today.
