Dear friends of HELP Jamaica!,
Before we see many of you again at the upcoming festivals, we would like to give you a quick update:
When Hurricane Melissa swept across western Jamaica at the end of October last year, devastating large areas of the country, we at HELP Jamaica! e.V. did not hesitate to act. We amended our association’s statutes to enable us to provide targeted assistance in the event of natural disasters.
Thanks to your overwhelming support, we have since been able to collect a total of almost €120,000 in purpose-bound donations for hurricane relief. We sincerely thank all donors and the organizers of the various charity events held in Germany and Switzerland. Without you, the help we can provide would not be possible.
From the very beginning, our goal was to ensure that support reached the areas where it was most urgently needed—quickly and directly. In several cases, we were able to do exactly that.
For example, we were able to provide the Great Start Academy—a primary school in St. Elizabeth—with an initial emergency grant of €10,000 just ten days after the hurricane. The primary objective was to restore a safe and structured daily routine for the children as quickly as possible. These funds were used to purchase generators and repair the school roof, among other things, enabling classes to resume without delay. In addition, hot meals were provided for the students, and additional staff were hired to offer emotional and psychological support to traumatized children.
As the Great Start Academy was one of the first schools in the region able to resume classes, it also opened its programmes to children from surrounding communities. Free preparatory courses for the upcoming CXC and PEP examinations were held on Saturdays to minimise disruptions to education.
At the request of the school administration, we subsequently extended this programme and provided an additional €9,400 in February. This funding enabled the launch of the “Plant A Seed” initiative—an interactive urban farming project in which local farmers teach students about sustainable agriculture, nutrition, and environmental responsibility.
So far, these efforts have been both timely and successful.
In December, we received approximately €50,000 each from two donors (these funds are included in the aforementioned total sum): from the Summerjam Festival following a sold-out ‘Rise Up’ charity concert in Cologne, and another donation from Dustin Brown, a former professional tennis player of Jamaican heritage.
Both major donors had specified particular schools they wished to support in their reconstruction efforts. In the case of the Summerjam Festival, the beneficiary is Black River High School in St. Elizabeth; in Dustin Brown’s case, it is Somerton Primary & Infant School in St. James, which his father used to attend.
We immediately contacted both schools. We were able to finalise a project agreement with Black River High School at an early stage, allowing us to transfer approximately €46,700 in February for urgently needed reconstruction work.
However, this is where new challenges emerged. The Jamaican government subsequently introduced regulations governing construction work at schools, requiring that all such work be carried out by certified contractors.
While this requirement is entirely understandable and appropriate from the perspective of ensuring sustainable, professional execution, these specialists have been fully booked for months following the extensive hurricane damage, causing significant delays in implementation.
These circumstances are beyond our control.
The situation at Somerton Primary & Infant School is similar. The school administration had to wait several months for quotations from a certified construction company and a building materials supplier. In the meantime, the National Education Trust (NET), a government agency, has also become involved in the process. This has further extended the timeline and delayed implementation.
Despite these challenges and delays, we are now beginning to see tangible progress on both projects and remain cautiously optimistic that construction work can begin as early as the start of the summer holidays.
At the same time, we want to be open about the fact that we had envisioned the reconstruction progressing much faster. Following the hurricane, we acted quickly to raise funds and prepare projects. Like many of our supporters, we had hoped that the aid would reach the affected children and young people more quickly and yield visible results sooner.
However, the reality on the ground reveals the challenges Jamaica faces after a natural disaster of this magnitude: a shortage of skilled workers, limited availability of materials, and regulatory requirements that, while entirely reasonable, take time to meet.
A key point for us is that the schools themselves decide which construction and infrastructure measures should take priority. Likewise, we have no influence over official approval processes, the availability of building materials, or the availability of the certified contractors carrying out the work.
We remain in close contact with the schools and authorities in Jamaica. At the same time, we are in regular contact with our major donors to ensure the highest level of transparency. This helps ensure that the donations we have collected are used specifically for the island’s reconstruction and directly benefit local educational institutions and projects.
We will, of course, continue to keep you regularly updated. As soon as construction work begins or the initial project phases are completed, we will document the progress and share it with you.
Regardless of the circumstances surrounding the reconstruction projects, our regular educational programmes and support initiatives are continuing as planned. These include, among others, support for the Freedom Skatepark in Bull Bay—a vital hub for social interaction and sport-based education—and Danijah’s well-established “Read Write Now” literacy and education programme, which he delivers at schools across Kingston and the surrounding parishes.
Finally, we would like to thank you for your trust, your patience, and your continued support. Together, we ensure that our assistance has a lasting impact and reaches exactly where it is needed—even if the process sometimes takes longer than we had hoped.
We look forward to welcoming you at our festival information booth and, as always, are excited about the many heartwarming reunions, festival vibes, and great conversations to come! Enjoy the summer and stay connected with us: Better Must Come!
Warm regards from Berlin,
Your team at HELP Jamaica! e.V.
