2018 elementary education graduate starts
school in Zambia and nonprofit to fund it Just in case you think a single person can’t make a mighty difference in the world, meet Savannah Turner. This Anderson University alumna stepped out in faith to answer what felt like an overwhelming calling and is now using her education and passion to teach and care for the most vulnerable children in the Zambian city of Lusaka.
“I felt the Lord tug at my heart and remind me of Zambia,” she said. “I worried how that would change my life, and so I ignored Him.”
In 2013, when Turner was 17, she went to Zambia for three weeks. She had been on many mission trips before, but she never anticipated a trip having the life-changing impact this one did. She spent the first part of it doing evangelism work in the public schools of Lusaka. One night, she and the other volunteers attended a crusade to start a new church, during which she shared her blanket with about 20 young children, all of them gathering as close as they could to look at her and to stay warm. It was then that she knew she would be back.
“I knew the Lord was asking me to go back to Zambia,” she said.
Fast-forward two years. Turner was a sophomore at Anderson University studying elementary education. As a Teaching Fellow receiving a grant that helped fund her college career, she felt extremely blessed. But she hadn’t thought much about Zambia until a sermon one evening encouraged students to go and share their faith with the world.
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Later that year, Turner attended the Passion Conference in Atlanta, where she felt the calling again.
was spurred on to love those kids and give “ Ithem the kind of education students receive when their teachers are Anderson University grads. I want that experience for everyone. — Savannah Turner, AU alumna
That time the calling was too strong to ignore. She reached out to a friend in Lusaka, Rev. Bitwell Njovu, and asked if she could visit for the summer. “I told him I didn’t know what I was supposed to do there, but I knew I needed to go,” she said.
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