Watoto=Children

By: Damilola Fagade

Watoto is one of the modules that Texas Lutheran University offers every semester in the fall. Every year, the students and faculty in the module put heads together to organize a kickball tournament that anybody can participate in, as long as they pitch in $5. This organization is nonprofit-based because all of the proceeds received from the event is sent to children in Tanzania.

This is in fact where the name “Watoto” came from. In the Swahili language, this means children. So how did this organization find its way from Africa to the United States of America? Dr. Shao, a computer systems professor at Texas Lutheran University, is from Tanzania. Due to opportunities he was given, he completed his education in the States and was given a job afterwards. Dr. Shao said, “even though he was not still at home he could make a small difference from afar.” This is why he chose to start up the module at Texas Lutheran. He said, “the main focus of this organization is just to help the children over there satisfy some of their needs.”

To start up in Texas Lutheran University, he said that he had gotten some help from the Center for Servant Leadership (CSL). At the time he had begun the Watoto module, there had been a different director but now, Morgan Klaser partners with him to work the module and govern the affairs. Ms. Klaser said, “she sees the mission statement of Watoto to serve a dual purpose.” Like Dr. Shao, she agreed that it definitely helps the Tanzanian children pay for their needs, but it also helps TLU students to see that the world is not all fine and dandy. Things actually go on and just having some sort of exposure could help them think more about the decisions that they make.

Shao and Klaser have both had experience in this field so organizing all of this isn’t particularly new to them. Dr. Shao made it known that he’s involved with the San Antonio and Austin community alongside TLU. This year’s kickball tournament that was held on October 4th, 2018, which counts as the third tournament that Ms. Klaser has actively been involved with. Also, being the director of the CSL, she’s had multiple opportunities to work with nonprofit communities.

A student in the module, Kelsey, said it was a great experience. The way she had heard about the module was when she was a freshman, with Dr. Shao as her FREX professor, he motivated her to feel involved. She also said that besides that, she thought this would be kind of interesting and it grew on her. Kelsey said she didn’t have that much experience in working the kickball tournament, so this was kind of a mini-exposure to the game as she was also the commentator of the tournament. Being part of the module also got her to feel a “little bit helpless”, especially from all the crazy news that we can never seem to escape in the world today. Her general opinion of the kickball tournament was that it was just right – competitive and fun, but not heated and not extremely calm. Kelsey’s opinion on helping to build Watoto and the kickball tournament was that people in the society should just come out and support and also try to get rid of their pocket changes to help support the funding that would go to the children in Tanzania. Her final words of advice were, “people should support in any way they can because this is all for a good cause.”

Speaking to one of the team players from “kicking it”, they confided that the reason they actually initially did the kickball tournament was just because they liked playing kickball together and this was fun for them. When they discovered the money that was gotten was not used for personal profit but instead to help the children in Tanzania, they were really impressed because according to him, “it isn’t very common for people to carry out selfless acts like that in today’s times.” He also said that if possible, the kickball tournament should not only be held in the fall, but there should also be another one in the spring. Not only would this help them come out more, but it will also help earn more money in general for the Tanzanian children.

To get another point of view from another team, the Minion coach and her son gave their feedback about how they felt the game was. Although, they did not win, they said that did not stop them from having fun. She said that this was her second year going out for the kickball tournament and same as last year, it was still a tremendous success that brought people in the society together to participate in something “worthwhile.” Her son said that to reach the optimum effect for the Tanzanian children, adding a different game such as basketball should make sort of a huge difference and that besides that, he thought the experience was a great bonding time.

Although the Watoto event is always a great success, Dr. Shao found that a few difficulties he faces is finding the best way to make the event more sustainable at TLU. He reasoned that he doesn’t want to be the only reason that the program is still a thing because he was a professor at TLU. He also said that recruiting people was kind of a struggle, but this year’s module student was the greatest number they had, and the kickball tournament was very easy to pull together due to them. He said the various ways that people could help is through prayers and also just the awareness of things going in the world.

Morgan said that her favorite part of being involved with Watoto was seeing how inspired and energetic students get over raising money to help children they’ve never met and would likely never meet. She said that during the whole process of getting the module together, she feels some sort of bond created between the students that participate in the module. She said, “there’s a connection developed between groups of people that might have never crossed paths because of their different majors and very busy schedules.”

The last person that was spoken to was another student that had wanted to take part in the module but didn’t have the opportunity to due to her schedule. She had said that her friend had taken the module in the past and had given her positive feedback about it. The individual she was talking about said she had been shaped to a totally different person than she had ever thought she could be. The change in her had been so profound that people also remarked it and according to her words, “she had become somewhat more emotionally intelligent” than she thought she was ever even capable of. She had said that just from watching the Tanzanian children videos that Dr Shao had presented removed any doubt from her mind and moved her to want to be a part of the program.

Finally, Dr Shao made it known that the money that was made was not even passed through him to the children in Tanzania but was put into a separate bank account that went directly through the Lutheran church in Tanzania to help improve the medical and educational facilities that the children had access to. Overall, the module raised over approximately 1,200 U.S. dollars which converts to about 2.8 million Tanzanian Shillings.

In reality, so many things have to be sacrificed to make an impact on any society. Like it is commonly said, “small changes make big differences in the long run.” As individuals, we just have to learn to exercise patience through tough times and also aim to be consistent when trying to get positive results.

Contact Information to get involved with Watoto!

Contact name: Morgan Klaser

Address: Center for Servant Leadership 1000 W Court Street Seguin, TX 78155

Hours: 8:00 am – 5.00pm Monday through Friday

Phone Number: (830) 305 9604

Website: http://www.tlu.edu/student-life/civic-engagement/

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Photos By: Audrey West