PROPOSED makeover at Manaca School
Manaca is a community school on the outskirts of Lusaka, in Lusaka West area. It was started by its dedicated principal and founder who provided the chicken house on her property to help educate local children who were unable to afford to attend the government school nearby.
In spite of its humble beginnings the school has grown to cater for almost 300 local children who come from up to 5km away to receive lessons in all of the standard school subjects. Staffed by 5 teachers, the school offers a very high standard of education with the majority of students in each class achieving sufficiently to move on to the next grade each year. As you can see fron the photos opposite, the school is badly in need of some renovation. The floor is falling apart and the roof and windows leak meaning that during the rainy season water comes through the ceiling. With around 50 children in most of the classrooms at one time, they are extremely cramped with up to 5 children occupying a desk made for 2. Upon visiting the school on the 12th April for a first Assessment, the Building Futures team were inspired to act and do everything they could to improve the facilities in Manaca school. They visited again a week later once the school had closed for the holidays to take measurements and begin to plan the project. We'll be publishing more details soon but among other things, we'd like to extend the classrooms to give more space, replace the roof, give the school a fresh coat of paint, some new windows and replace the broken desks and chairs. As usual, we'll be bringing the community together to meet this challenge and, we hope, having a lot of fun while we do it. At the moment, we're recruiting a team of volunteers to get involved with the project and making partnerships with any organisation who might be able to help out. If you could help, either by giving your time, contributing tools or building materials please get in touch. |
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