Makeni School Project

 

We had the opportunity to venture away from the office and go to Makeni School. It was about an hour drive from where we work. It was nice to get away!! This is another Humanitarian Project in process.

 

                                                                

                                                                        School kids

Here you see some of the existing buildings. I am always intrigued by the barb wire they put along the hedges. I guess that is one way to keep the children off the grass. No such thing as a play ground...just dirt.

 

   This is the flushing latrines that are being build. And this building was being built for staff housing. It will hold two families.

                         

There was a chicken roaming around. Can you see it? This was also a burn pile where it was smoldering.

 

One set of school classrooms.

The Deputy headmaster (the lady showing us around) called these girls over to greet us. I learned that the different colors of their uniforms was representative of which age group they were in. The girls were very gracious and said, "Thank you!" many times! The kids always love to get their picture taken and then afterward I will show them their picture and they just start giggling! It's pretty cute!

The Church provided money for 500 desks for this school. A local person makes the desks and they have to be made to a certain standard. Elder Pease said they had to get after (that's not really the right word) one man because his work was not very good.

Notice, these are very simple desks and the room is packed!

 

This project will greatly help the school, as you can imagine. We were told that the early Primary grades have 70 children per class with one teacher. There are 3 sessions each day.

Currently, the contractors are waiting on the roofing materials that they were expecting in the next few days. Then the roof will go on. All plumbing and electrical is done after the outside structure is completed.

 

                                        Won't this be so nice to have this much more room?!

Elder Phelps is talking to Dorothy, the Deputy Headmaster (second in command). She told us that she has been working at this school since 1998. She started out as a teacher and has worked her way up to Deputy Headmaster.

 

The grounds of the existing school.

 This fence was really interesting. It is made of grass. We were told the grass is gathered everywhere! It was super tight...you couldn't poke your finger through it.

I didn't get a picture of the garden. Students were planting carrots and pumpkin seed.