The first walls go up on our permanent classroom block

When the school opened in 2012 the classrooms were built from what the community had: eucalyptus poles, off-cut timber and iron sheets. They were meant to last a few years. Most are still in use. They are dark, they leak and in the rainy season the noise on the roof makes teaching close to impossible.

Now, the first permanent block has been completed. It holds two classrooms, each big enough for fifty children, with proper windows, a concrete floor and a ceiling to deaden the rain. The foundation trenches were dug by hand by our builders, parents and a group of visiting student volunteers from the UK.

The bricks were fired locally and the labour is from the village, so the money raised stays in the community. Though the new building is already in use by Primary 1 and Primary 2, it is still incomplete; we expect to plaster the walls and cement the floor before the year ends. Four more blocks are needed, one at a time, to replace every temporary room.