SACU Budget for 2022 with Charity Status Influence!

SACU’s budget for 2022 is $141,000 Cdn.  The expected $450 Sponsorships per student will provide $93,000. With the supplemental donations that we hope to receive in the amount of $16,200, our financial needs for the Education Fund will be met for the year.  It is our goal to raise over $32,000 for Non-profit needs through fund-raising activity. As a result, the expected income and expenses for 2022 are laid out below.

The expenses for SACU include tuition payments to SAC Buikwe (U), the Primary School. This tuition pays for our teacher salaries, utilities for the school, breakfast and lunch meal fund, fees and registration for National exams, as well as the new payroll taxes.  Secondary School tuition pays for similar items at the 3 Post Primary Schools we send students to, St Julian, Quality & St Charles Technical.  These expenses are considered Charitable by Revenue Canada. Post Primary School personal boarding costs, for those going out of town, include personal items each student requires, school items and uniforms. Unfortunately, these boarding costs are not tax-deductible.

SHELTER COSTS:

Children help prepare the meals!

The cost of operating the shelters and providing special events (Easter and Christmas dinners) for 2022 is about $23,000.  Typically 30 children live in the two shelters.  Fund-raising throughout the year, supplemented with generous non-deductible donations, will be necessary to cover these costs. Shelter expenses include salaries for house mothers & food for meals outside of school days. 

The effects of school closure

Schools in Uganda were essentially shuttered from March 2020 to January 2022. Through sponsorships, donations and fundraising we were able to meet SACU’s financial needs in 2020 and 2021.  Now in 2022, we are seeing the effects of the past 2 years.

  • rising food costs, delivery fees, school van fuel, firewood & electricity costs
  • impact of the government extending semesters from 12 weeks to 14 weeks to catch up for lost time
  • formal registration with several more government agencies allowing us to form SACU Buikwe (U) which is the account for SACU Primary school fees
  • SACU is now part of a pension plan for staff funded by employer & employee called Payroll Tax, this adds $500/mth to our expenses
  • the hiring of an accountant to ensure accurate documentation of expenses & income was necessary
  • we continue to search for an experienced education secretary to manage the data for all the students. 

Our charitable status requires us to have a consistent & high level of communication of the student’s grades and performance, which supports our need for additional administrative staff and deemed necessary. 

After 18 months of writing & rewriting our application, we were fortunate to receive our charitable status for 2022! In this way, the increase in sponsorship can be offset with a charitable receipt for most of our Sponsors.  After much discussion and budget review, it was felt that this was the right time to make the change in sponsorship fees.