By William Opio
On most school holidays, Omega Kwagala Mulungi’s home of four biological members felt like a small village.
Children often filled the compound. Some even often stayed over. Relatives who needed support found a place to sleep. Meals were shared among whoever was present at the table that day.
By the end of it all, nearly 30 children could be living under one roof.
In all this, Omega’s family was not one you could call wealthy.
Her father served as a priest in Ndejje, Luwero district. Her mother was a secondary school teacher. The couple relied on modest incomes and small-scale farming to care for a growing household that always seemed to have room for one more child.
“We only had two biological children in the home,” Omega says.
“But my mother has a soft heart. If she saw someone struggling, she would take them in. We always had people around us.”
School fees were rarely paid comfortably. Sometimes children returned to school with only part of what was needed.
“If you took sh50,000, they would allow you into class for another two weeks,” she recalls. “Then you would figure out the rest later.”
Yet despite the uncertainty, Omega remembers her childhood with gratitude.
“I loved having so many people around me,” says Omega, a recent Bachelor of Nursing Science graduate of Uganda Christian University (UCU)
She believes those years shaped almost everything she has become.
Her parents taught her to trust God, to value relationships and to understand that people, and not possessions, are life’s greatest wealth.
While at UCU, she served in Chapel Choir Ministries, participated in the Honors College. She hopes to pursue further studies in addiction science and mental health.
After struggling through a difficult health experience and failing to find the specialized support she needed, Omega became determined to help others facing similar challenges.
That determination eventually led her toward a growing interest in behavioral addictions, mental health, and addiction psychology, fields she believes remain underserved in Uganda.
But while her ambitions were growing, financial challenges, too, grew. University life often felt like a balancing act between studying and worrying.
Her parents remained committed to supporting her education, but the burden was heavy.
“There was never a doubt that my parents wanted me to study,” Omega says. “The challenge was always how to make it happen.”
One evening, during a campus fellowship service, a preacher encouraged students to pray for the people God would use to help them.
As she walked back to her hostel, she carried the weight of tuition deadlines and financial uncertainty.
“God, help my helpers locate me,” she prayed on her way home.
The next day, her phone rang.
A conversation followed.
Eventually, she found herself sitting with visitors she had never met before.
Nearly an hour later, one of them said something she never expected to hear.
“They told me they wanted to pay my tuition for the rest of my degree.”
For a moment, she thought she had misunderstood.
“I just stared at them and said, ‘What?’”
Through a scholarship program supported by Uganda Partners, Omega received the support that would transform her university experience.
The constant anxiety that had followed her into every semester began to ease. As a result, her academic performance improved and new opportunities emerged.
“My results improved drastically,” she says. “I could think about joining the Honors College. I could think about opportunities. I could think about the future.”
Yet the greatest impact was the emotional freedom it brought.
“When you’re constantly struggling, it’s difficult to dream,” she explains. “You think about surviving today. You don’t always have the space to think about tomorrow.”
Growing up, she watched her parents share the little they had with dozens of children. At university, she experienced that same spirit through strangers who chose to invest in her future.
Now she hopes to continue that cycle.
“I realized I may never be able to repay what was done for me,” she says. “But I can pay it forward.”
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To support UCU programs, students, activities and services, go to www.ugandapartners.org and click on the “donate” button, or contact UCU Partners Executive Director, Mark Bartels, at m.t.bartels@ugandapartners.org.
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