Her Future Foundation is an organization dedicated to empowering girls and ending sexual violence in Sierra Leone.
This page is created by grassroots fundraiser Sofia Wren Nitchie to help their mission.
Current Goal: Aminata
Our current goal is to raise funds for Aminata’s 2nd year fees for college education:
$ 700 total needed for Aminata’s college education.
Includes:
-$200 needed for lab fees
-$500 needed for university tuition – due mid April 2025
…
$150 RAISED
(updated March 12)
$550 TO GO
Proceeds help Aminata
Student Profile 2: Aminata
- Year 3 pharmacy degree student
- Orphaned, her parents died shortly after enrolling in college
- comes from a city with low female literacy in Sierra Leone
Aminata estimates only 20% of the girls she grew up with learned how to read.
Her mother’s greatest dream was for her to attend college.
She had just enrolled in her first year when her mother unexpectedly died. She is without any other parent.
This community helped her pay for her second year in 2024.
We want to help her pay another year of college for 2025, year three of her pharmacy program.
This degree will allow her to have a job that she said does not involve heavy labor, which is the alternative future she would have without it.
Join us in helping to support her future –we welcome all donations regardless of size 
Every bit helps.
Aminata’s mother was a humanitarian in the community when she was alive, and we hope to give thanks to that generous spirit by making sure that her beloved, Aminata can provide for herself.
We know that this gift through Aminata’s earnest spirit and future labor in pharmacy will have ripples of positive effect in her community as well for many years to come.
How to donate
Send your donation to one of the places below.
The suggested donation is $25 but ANY amount helps.
You will be sending your money to me, Sofia
I will then be transferring money to Her Future Foundation in Sierra Leone for their programs.
- Venmo @Sofia-Nitchie or
- PayPal https://www.paypal.me/SofiaNitchie
- Or you can donate through GivenGain if you prefer to send it directly to the Her Future Foundation organization. There is a delay of 2-4 weeks before the funds arrive via GivenGain. We may have to apply your funds to a future fundraiser if we do not receive it in time. It will be added to our tallies when processed. Pay through GivenGain
About this work
People like you and I can make a difference helping girls to have an empowered voice in communities that seriously need it.
There are a lot of problems in the world, but due to the currency exchange Western donations make a huge impact.
Because western currencies are worth a lot more than the local currencies in the area, every bit that we can donate goes a long way.
How they help:
Her Future Foundation organizes transformational gender-based programming, and
identifies vulnerable girls and women who need resources to avoid female genital mutilation (FGM), child marriage, gender-based violence, and sexual assault.
They help us to direct resource to where it will make the most impact to help girls and women in Sierra Leone.
What is it like in Sierra Leone for women?
Sexual assault of minors is so common, it’s been declared a national emergency.
Women face lots of violence, FGM, poverty, domestic abuse and are rarely able to go to college.
Over 50% of women are scared of their husbands.
Many girls feel forced to survive via prostitution (at least half of girls in SL exchange sex for money, food, water, shelter, or transportation).
Her Future Foundation operates in a region where 90% of women have already gone through FGM.
This does not truly heal in the genitals and causes life long problems.
This area of Sierra Leone is very poor and there are no other NGOs operating there.
Often girls have no money for school uniforms to get basic education, or stop school after menstruation because they don’t have money for menstrual supplies.
How did Her Future Foundation start?
It began when Ariefa Kumara, the founder of Her Future Foundation, heard about a girl in the community being married off.
She was a 8 year old orphan, and the community scheduled an FGM ceremony for her.
She would be married afterwards to an older man.
Ariefa thought it was wrong. Long story short: Ariefa and his mother convinced the community to stop this event.
He was successful and instead of child marriage, the girl became a student. They started a community school to enroll the child in.
Other children go to this school to this day, and they also opened a school in a second location that continues to operate.
On top of that, they run additional programs to support and educate girls, boys and the community through Her Future Foundation. (Pics below) Her Future Foundation is an expansion of the work to end FGM and to bring a better future to girls and women.
If you’d like more information let me know!
How I know Her Future Foundation is legit:
There are a lot of scammers so it’s ok to wonder.
I met Ariefa, the founder of HFF through my nonprofit friends in DC. They met him in person at a US nonprofit conference.
I’ve also verified his work is legitimate through State Department officials who saw his organization’s work in Sierra Leone.
He has worked with the EU, UN, and various embassies in Sierra Leone. He has all proper documentation as an NGO.
Her Future Foundation is a legit organization, but it is small and grassroots without the typical resources of a US nonprofit (flashy marketing department, website, etc.).
Unfortunately the best online resource they had — their facebook page– was hacked summer 2024 and had to be removed.
Their website is up but a work in progress
So I’ll include some photos of their work below.
They don’t have paypal infrastructure in Sierra Leone or many local donors! That’s why I’m helping to fundraise and send funds to them.
Here’s some pics of their community events:
How to donate
You will be sending your money to me, Sofia at one of the places below.
I will then be transferring money to Her Future Foundation in Sierra Leone for their programs.
- Venmo @Sofia-Nitchie or
- PayPal https://www.paypal.me/SofiaNitchie
- Or you can donate through GivenGain if you prefer to send it directly to the Her Future Foundation organization. There is a delay of 2-4 weeks before the funds arrive via GivenGain. We may have to apply your funds to a future fundraiser if we do not receive it in time. It will be added to our tallies when processed. Pay through GivenGain
If you have questions contact me, and
please feel free to forward this to a friend who might like to help someone this season.
Because let’s hear it….
GIRLS AND WOMEN MATTER!!
Thanks for reading!
P.S. We Are Celebrating the Success that we have had so far thanks to our community’s help
Thank you for contributing to Our Most Recent Success!
Completed Goal 1
Our last goal was to raise funds for Ismatu’s 2nd year fees for college education:
$ 980 total needed for Ismatu’s college education.
Includes:
-$380 needed for required lab equipment (Goal met!)
-$600 needed for university tuition – due end Feb 2025 (Goal met!)
…
$980 RAISED
(updated March 3)
SUCCESS!
Student Profile 1: Ismatu
- Year 2 microbiology degree student
- women’s rights advocate and activist
- award winning, talented debator
- comes from indigenous community with low female literacy in Sierra Leone
I was on the phone last year with an amazing young girl from Sierra Leone, named Ismatu.
She told me that she used to be scared.
Ismatu is her name–
She said as a young, Muslim, indigenous girl, it was scary to visit communities where she knew no one.
But she wanted to talk to the women there.
She wanted to talk to them about traditions that hurt women like FGM, and why it must stop.
Over 90% of women there have already gone through FGM.
She wants to change the cycle.
So even though it was scary and uncomfortable, Ismatu had a mission to help women and girls.
So she kept going as a teenage women right’s advocate in a country where abuse against women is all too common. That fear did not stop her.
Where she is from 90% of women cannot read a sentence.
Not only did she finish high school,
but she won a regional high school debate on the topic,
“Why Girls Deserve an Education.”
We want to see her succeed.
We want to see her shine brighter and finish her college education.
We want to see a girl like her, blooming out of rough soil, show everyone in her country what girls can do.
We want to amplify her voice.
In 2024 we as a community were able to raise her college funds in 24 hours, and now she is ready for Year 2.
Please help us to raise enough funds to cover her college fees so she does not need to drop out of college.
Her goal is to graduate with a degree in microbiology and gain financial independence with a paying job. She also wants to use science to save lives.
Please donate what you can to help our students stay in school and achieve the independent future that they dreams about.
Thank you!
