Mbokomu

OVERVIEW

More than half of people living in rural Tanzania live below the poverty line and often do not have access to safe drinking water, good educational facilities or adequate medical treatment. We’ve partnered with two schools in the heart of a rural community to try to combat these issues. Mbokomu School and Father Neville’s school are based in the small village of Korini Kusini, in the foothills of the stunning Kilimanjaro. Around 500 students between the ages of 5-16 years attend the schools and many have to walk over 20 km a day just to attend classes. This area also suffers from large-scale soil erosion caused by biannual floods, which makes it very difficult to produce crops and leaves the children with virtually no usable sports field or recreation area.

Since 2007 our volunteers have helped us to make significant positive changes to the lives of the children here by enhancing school buildings, developing facilities, building a large dining hall/community centre and working on extensive erosion control and landscaping of the area.

What ARE THE MAIN ISSUES?

Poverty
Lack of good infrastructure
Frequent and severe flooding
Lack of appropriate water storage causing localised droughts
Lack of financial support

PROJECT TIMELINE

2007:

Classroom refurbishment – renovated the kindergarten block, including plastering and building the corridor
Desk making – constructed over 100 desks for students
Tree Nursery – created a small tree nursery in the school

2008:

Artwork – Developed educational murals on school buildings including topics such as human anatomy, mathematical formulas, diagrams and maps
Dining Hall – Started this three-year project to build a new dining hall for the schools that can also act as a meeting place and theatre for the community
Furniture repairs – including many desks, cupboards, shelves, tables and chairs
Water Project – Dug trenches and buried pipes to supply water to the schools. The schools have water every second day but due to lack of enough rainfall outside the rainy seasons and population growth within Mbokomu the taps are always dry
Feeding Programme – started feeding programme whereby volunteers prepare and serve breakfast to the school children

2009:

Dining Hall: Phase 2 – continuing build of dining hall
Teaching assistance – teaching conversational English and sports coaching

2010:

Dining Hall: Phase 2 – continuing build of dining hall including adding the roof to the building
Landscaping school grounds – addressing erosion issues and creating a playing/extra curricular activities field

2011:

Dining Hall: Completion of Dining Hall
Landscaping school grounds – addressing erosion issues and creating a playing/extra curricular activities field

YOUR ROLE AS A VOLUNTEER

Project work will vary depending on the needs of the community at any one time but may include:

Ongoing improvement of school infrastructure and facilities that may involve low-level construction, painting or plastering
Completing construction of dining hall
Improving water catchment to the schools
Working to reduce the effects of erosion
Providing teaching assistance (conversational English and basic computer skills) as well as playing sports with the children
Creating educational displays as a teaching aid for students
Developing and running environmental education workshops to teach children and adults the value of conserving wildlife and preserving the environment
Establishing a successful tree nursery at the school

Camp Tanzania: Volunteer in Africa

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Mbokomu

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