LearnAsOne

There was a total power and Internet failure last night so I apologise that this update is a little late.

On Wednesday I met with FEWEZA (Forum for African Women Educationalists of Zambia), the second of four potential NGO partners I plan to meet this week.

They have been working in Zambia since 1996 and have programs all across the country including 58 interventions in the Southern region. This covers everything from scholarships, to reading clubs, safe houses for girls and working with communities and the government to build schools.

Musukotwane Basic School in Kazangula Province, about 50kms north of Livingstone.

I was taken to visit Musukotwane Basic, a government school which has 8 classrooms for 452 pupils (56 pupils per class). I was told that most of these classrooms leak during the rainy season and around two-thirds of pupils don’t have a desk.

One double classroom block even has a bee infestation which the community are unable to get rid of. There is approximately 1 text book per 10 pupils. The school does have 16 government funded teachers, but only 6 teacher’s houses for them to live in.

In one classroom we were met by an angry swarm of bees

Despite this Musukotwane is one of the most advanced schools in the area teaching all the way through to grade 9 (primary education is up to grade 7). This means some children are forced to travel from up to 18kms away if they want to continue their studies so there is a great need for boarding facilities.

I learnt all this whilst being shown around the school by the head teacher Mr Dominic M. Sumusuka. He was also very keen to highlight that there is no High School within 100kms of Musukotwane so if pupils want to enter grades 10, 11 or 12 their only options is to travel and become a boarder far away from home. That’s assuming their parents can afford the school fees. There are currently 68 pupils waiting to enter grade 10 in the area.

Some of the children at the community meeting

To conclude the brief visit a community meeting was called to explain why we were there: primarily to get an understanding of what FEWEZA does and to listen to the needs of the community they recommended to us. This was very clearly explained to all parties from the outset and no guarantee of funding was made.

It also gave the community the chance to ask questions and for some of the parents, teachers and the pupils to explain the the greatest needs as they saw it. Classrooms for grades 10-12 plus boarding facilities was the unanimous answer.

So where does this leave us?

The first thing we need to do is pick an NGO who we can trust. FEWEZA come highly recommended, partner with some major donors like USAID, UNICEF and World Vision, plus they have a very strong relationship with the Ministry of Education.

In terms of the project the needs in the community are vast, especially for a High School, so that children no longer have to travel over 100kms to continue their education. But we can only start with one project and we need to weigh this up against the need for basic schools in communities who are at the very start of their education journey: the kind of project we had in mind before traveling to Zambia.

There is a clear need for both and this is was backed up by a meeting with representatives from the Ministry of Education at the end of the day. It’s something I need a little time to mull over with the trustees, but it’s great that there are now two strong options for partnerships and there are still two more NGOs to meet!