The schools

Where to help first?

There are 80 million children who are missing out on education, so choosing which one to help first is no easy task. So, we’ve put together some simple rules to ensure your money gets spent where it’s needed most.

The selection criteria

• Literacy rate – For LearnAsOne to offer support to a school it must be in a country whose literacy rate is in the bottom 20% as defined in the United Nations Development Programme Report 2006.

• Presence of an established local partner – LearnAsOne works in partnership with local NGOs (non-governmental organisations) to help provide the education solutions that local communities need. Their specialised local knowledge and presence is key to ensuring support is delivered in a responsible and sustainable way.

Searching for the first school

While rushing in head first is often the most exciting thing to do, it’s almost always the least prudent. So we are currently in discussions with former trustees and current employees of overseas development charities about exactly where LearnAsOne will have the most impact.

Ethiopia looks like the country we’ll be starting work in. It’s one of the poorest countries in the world with a literacy rate of just 42.4%, and where 36.6% of children are not enrolled in primary schools. Our preliminary discussions have pointed us in the direction of numerous potential partners within the county which we are in the process of following up.

How much will the school cost?

That very much depends on the size of the school, exactly where it’s located and how much the local building materials and labour costs. What we can tell you is that research shows the average cost to build a school is around £25,000.

For a brand new charity raising this amount of money is unlikely to be an overnight task. So the last thing we want to do is make a promise to a community that we will fund their new school until LearnAsOne is in the position to do so. To avoid this, a decision has been made not to take any discussions beyond the preliminary stage until the first £10,000 has been raised. At this point a visit to Ethiopia will be scheduled to fully scope out potential partners and projects. We have no doubt that the required £25,000 will be raised, but we hope you understand why this cautious approach is being adopted at this stage.

You can keep up to date with the progress towards the first £10,000 on the blog and we will of course share the key developments in the search. If you have any questions about this approach or suggestions of NGOs we should be speaking to please get in touch and let us know. Thank you.