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The beginning....
The school, near the source of the Nile, has a roll of around 600 pupils. We split up and gave ourselves two tasks. Miss Emma created large wall displays for Science and Maths, initially in pencil and then in paint. These would be filled in by the Dragoman Overlander volunteer truck arriving soon. Mr R-D taught a range of classes with a Ugandan teacher, sharing ideas and demonstrating the use of resources brought from England.
Here is the same classroom with Miss Emma's wall drawings painted in by Dragoman volunteers on a community project (see below for more photos of project work)
The school staff
UPE (Universal Primary Education) was introduced ten years ago and allows the first four children of every family to go to school free of charge. The years are arranged from P1 to P7, and if a child fails to pass the year end exams then the child must resit the year. Children start school at approximately 5 years of age, but entrance requirements are flexible. These two factors contribute to a very large range of ages in the classes. The main four subjects taught are English, Maths, Science and SST (humanities and PSE). English is officially taught to all children from P1 upwards, but few become independent English speakers until P5 or above.
Courtyard constructing (before)....
Whilst Miss Emma created internal delights in the school, Mr R-D designed a plan which would hopefully create a courtyard outside the L-shaped classroom block. This would replace an area of bricks, stone and hard packed murrum mounds (or mud in the torrential rainy season downpours). One particular criteria which was essential to make the heavy duty task appealing to the 'volunteers' was that "mixing cement must be involved somewhere!")
Courtyard constructing (after)....
Thanks to some serious hard work all day, the generosity of Bingo at the Nile River Explorers and Hannah for setting up the whole project visit from Dragoman the project was a success.
Hard work was a serious understatement there.
During the day local children, the occasional parent and Owino Moses (one of the teachers) tentatively became increasingly involved. We couldn't have done it without their continual supply of picks, spades and other strange tools.
Mr Moses Owino completed the project by painting the trees at the entrance to the school in the Ugandan national colours. The effect was amazing! The Dragoman gang headed back to the campsite for some deserved 'nourishment', whilst we headed of to paradise (Murchison Falls Paraa Lodge)
Following the successful day, Softpower Education was born. A company was set up and a few years later we successfully registered it as a charity in the UK. For more information on how you can help, click on the banner below....
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