The Springs Alive Children's Center still in need of real support

The Springs Alive Children's Center (SPACC) is a small center that is dedicated to supplying the basic educational and nutritional needs of children from the local villages. People in this part of the world are mostly poor and daily life is about survival, more than anything else. The area has been peaceful for some years now, but the recovery from decades of war and unrest, and the HIV/AIDS epidemic, is slow.

SPACC stands as a beacon of hope in the community. For many children and orphans, getting an education (and sometimes food) is their only hope of escaping the cycle of poverty.  The school is only seven years old and started with children learning in the shade of the trees. With contributions from various schools and individuals in Europe and the US, the school has managed to grow and build basic classrooms to house the more than 150 students who now attend.  

Teaching staff is the most important part of any school and SPACC has been blessed with teachers who have been prepared to work for below average salaries. The school is constantly challenged with money problems as it relies mostly on meager school fees from the parents, many of whom cannot afford to pay. Supplementing this income is not an easy task as the school does not even have electricity, computers, running water or proper ablutions.    

Recently, due to a drought, many parents who are subsistence farmers have been struggling and payments to SPACC have dwindled. The school ran out of funds and has been unable to pay the teachers what they are owed. Some of the teachers have chosen to go to court in an attempt to get their salaries.

SPACC remains dedicated to keeping the children in school and will do everything in its power to keep the school open and caring for the children. The challenge is to raise money to settle the teacher's salaries. The school is appealing to well-wishers, friends and charity organizations who are prepared to contribute towards the $4000 per term, that it costs to run the school.

Springs Alive Community school is still operational amidst challenges

It's been seven years since Springs Alive Community School (SPACS) opened its doors and we have overcome many challenges and enjoyed many victories. We started in tree shade, then moved into papyrus thatched, partially walled class rooms, and finally through friends and well-wishers like Mr. Colin, Madam Sue Bishop, Dr. Nunley and many others, we now have 2 permanent classroom blocks. Most of our children come from very poor families which are unable to afford an education. We have however managed to expose them to foreign cultures and a lot of new things which take place in non- African countries. This was achieved by partnering with foreign schools and exchanging letters. Some of the things our pupils have learnt include;
•Putting on a happy face and smiling - regardless of their hardships.
•How to speak respectfully to others
•Types of plant that suit a foreign environment, we have exchanged plants and seedlings grown both here and abroad.
•Local politics, laws and children’s rights.
•And then of course the school curriculum.

Much of what SPACS has achieved today is as a result of having partner schools. We are extremely grateful to everyone who has supported us with looking after the well-being and good education of our children and the school at large. We are especially grateful to the people who have helped us get through term two 2012 (May – July). We believe that God is working through them. Our recent challenge was a letter we received from the Kakiri Town Council – requested that we close the school due to the state of the school’s pit latrine (which was formerly meant for a home setting and now had become for a school of over 150 pupils) see picture of former pit latrine and the new pit latrine.

We pleaded with the council and were given two weeks to construct a new pit-latrine. There was no money available, but with the Lord's help, we found enough money to put up a new pit- latrine (though still incomplete) in the required time. We therefore did not need to close the school.

 During the same term, feeding our staff and students became very difficult as we had to use funds to build the new pit-latrine as well as repairing part of the classroom blocks. The drought that persisted for some months meant we could not grow food in our garden and many of our pupils braved being hungry at school. The drought also reduced the parents and guardian’s contributions toward the pupil’s school fees. We are proud to announce that we managed to keep all our eight teachers for the complete term. This is a great achievement as usually we would lose two or three teachers due to a lack of funds. We did however have to cancel the school house competitions. We managed to hold parent’s meetings twice, staff meetings took place weekly and management committee meetings were held twice. Thanks to everybody that has contributed to the success and wellbeing of our school. God bless us all.

urgent-plea-from-springs-alive-school.

If you've been following Kathie Nunley's newsletter for awhile, you know that they've adopted a small village school in Kakiri, Uganda. If you are not familiar, please watch our short video at: Nunley for Uganda she heard from the school director this week with an urgent plea. A storm has torn a large hole in the side of one of their 2 primitive buildings, making it unstable. In addition, they were unable to raise funds to make the required improvements to their pit latrine. The Kakiri Town Council is threatening to close the school. They have been given 2 weeks to make the repairs or close - leaving the village children without any school and most without at least one daily meal. They need $600 to make the minimum repairs. she's hoping at least 60 readers of her newsletter can find a way to collect $10 from their school / classes to donate to help Springs Alive school. Most of us know that just having a can to collect spare change can easily secure $10. We need it by the first part of next week. You can donate w/ your credit card at our bookshop: You will see an order button in the to!p row, right under the blue Help4Teacher banner Email me if you have any questions. THANK YOU

High grades alone don’t mean success

There is excitement every time primary, and secondary examinations are released. For the few who score high grades, their photos are splashed on national dailies while majority who do not make it go unnoticed.

This is not surprising since tradition has always been to reward ‘winners’ and
punish ‘losers’.

But are high grades a predictor of success? Do bright students perform well in their jobs? Evidence shows otherwise.

In 1973, Prof. David C. McClelland of Harvard University in his paper, Testing for competence rather than intelligence, argued that competence (underlying characteristics of an individual such as empathy, self-discipline and initiative) is the major predictor of superior job performance and success in life, not traditional academic aptitude and knowledge (IQ).

His research found that people with a high IQ often performed poorly at work. Indeed in our day-to-day interactions, bright persons tend to be argumentative and inconsiderate — behaviours that jeopardise group existence.

Of recent, these attributes have been framed into what is conventionally known as Emotional Intelligence (EQ), and includes personal and social competencies individuals require to manage themselves and others’ emotions.

Unfortunately, these attributes are never taught in schools and universities. Instead, effort is put on acquiring knowledge — something that does not increase one’s ability of getting, retaining a job and performing excellently at work.

Many people after being through school don’t still know how to write a report, develop a project plan, or use a computer.

Thus you find that when they find themselves in a leadership position, they fail to build a strong team and in the end get fired!

Most time the blame is put on a flawed educational system. Other times there has been upgrades for instances to learn skills like report writing, but still devoid of what an employer calls competence.

Thus although IQ may be important, EQ is indispensable. As universities churn out more graduates, it is important they possess the attributes to fit and work in a team.

What one scores in school should not be an issue, rather how they use these grades to create opportunities and contribute to society.

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