Expecting a Visitor from Leeds, UK

"I look forward to hearing from you and to develping an exchange programme which will benefit our children at Springs Alive and Whitkirk." - Leeds, UK

Thank you very much for having got in touch. It has been a long wait though and I think this time you will manage to make it. We are still very excited awaiting your visit to us my Dear! Needless to say , I have to mention here in this still very early introduction that Madam Sue Bishop really would want collaboration with your school to work! I can mention that she has seen our school get a new classroom block and now the exchange visit, to mention but a few!

(a picture of Chloe Hogdson with some of the Kids and Guardians at SPACC)

We therefore have very high expectation as a result of your coming here and also an innovation that will see our one time called impoverished school turn “to be of international renown”! I have shared with you a Google document on some more information of the expectations of visitors coming to Springs Alive and frequently asked questions.

Martin

Great Need has Turned into Big Fun!!

Hallo there, great need has turned into big fun!!

It is unbelievable for a student from SPACC to compete with students of the so called better schools in the community and turns to be the best. What a privilege it was!!

Students at SPACC asked fellow students from other schools to join together for quiz competition, two from each school. The other students were so sure they would win ours, while the pupils of SPACC were half sure! Shockingly when the results came out, two from SPACC were the best.

Why did it happen?

Pupils from SPACC were always challenged by the messages in the letters they got especially from Creek View Primary school pupils. They do comment that the children seem to be younger than them but the things they talk about are big.

Say:

• The clubs they have
• The preparations they do towards Christmas
• The topics they talk about; because most of their topics are studied in secondary school in Uganda e.g. History

Our pupils developed confidence which caused every teacher at SPACC to wonder. The pupils say that since they have international connections, they too must turn international and they are now very serious with their academics in order to be different from the local schools and pupils here.

During the struggle to become international, one student amazed the whole school. She failed to pass to go to Primary five last year,2008.She repeated Primary four in 2009 but said that “how can an international student fail a class? I will never be after the first best three”. Term one, she was the first and term two she was the second! No one believed she could perform that way. Internationalism!!!

Thank you our blog readers because through you SPACC has been put on the map (in the limelight!) in the community and outside. We have been able to put up more classrooms, also a friend from the U.S donated to us scholastic materials, which included learning aids such as charts, text books, writing pads, pencils to mention but a few.

Thank you for being so supportive in turning SPACC into a real school!!!

Have you ever seen or heard of unprofessional teachers challenging those who are the so called “professionals”? It has started happening at SPACC because really our teachers have a heart for the underprivileged children in our school.

Thank you

Our Prayers Have Been Answered

Praise God, On October 27 a generous donation was received from Roath Park School. We are very grateful for the continued efforts of Roath Park to help us improve classroom conditions for our students. We hope they will visit soon and see first hand how carefully and intentionally we have managed their donations improving the quality of life for the children in our community.

THE LATEST FROM SPRINGS ALIVE CHILDREN’S CENTRE(SPACC)

In a struggle to construct a classroom at Springs Alive Children’s centre (SPACC), after Roath Park visitors gave some gifts to SPACC which included scholastic materials eg.pens, pencils, rulers, sharperners, colour pencils, text books, a laptop computer, balls for soccer and rugby, clothes, dolls and some money to embark on a few renovations, many people have been wondering how we are progressing with such breakthrough SPACC achieved.

• SPACC has continued to support Education in this area given all hurdles we pass through.Parents, guardians and the children look at this school with good hope of thriving.
• Some of the money has been used as follows:

1. There was a garage which had been built long ago but wasn’t yet roofed. This is now roofed and inhere we now have nursery classes ie.baby, middle and top class all study from here.
2. There was an old classroom block, which has been repaired. In this classroom block we now have P.5 and P.3 study in the same room, after demolishing the wall which was in the middle of this class that was preventing enough fresh air to come in and also create enough room for one class just in case, in future we built more classes. The other separate room on this same block, which used to be the black room, the nickname Julian and Simon gave it after seeing it(originally this room used to be a kitchen) in which P.5 used to study, after it was refurbished has once been used as a teacher’s residential house, in which 2 teachers used to sleep. We had to tell the teachers to rent a house, now the room is sometimes either used by Primary 4 or Primary 2.
3. We also used some money to start on building the foundation for the new classrooms with the hope that if our friends from Roath Park added us more money, we would get somewhere with the building. We were asked by our friends from Roath Park to give them the total cost of what it would take to complete the whole new classroom building. Then the work was halted because this needed us to get someone who was technical in this field to write for us a “bill of Quantity”.
4. We now have a reduced number of 3 classes still studying in papyrus made classes(they have no classroom yet) ie.P.1,P.2 and P.4(the picture is attached) and Nursery class still study together in the Garage ie.Baby class, Middle class and Top class.

PUPILS AND PARENTS ENGAGE SPACC:

In one of the recent parents and teacher’s meeting, it was agreed that parents, teachers and SPACC pupils who can, should once in a while come together and make local bricks made from soil, in order to make a contribution toward what Roath Park did. The parents and teachers saw it a challenge, Roath Park coming all the way from UK in Europe to give support to an insignificant school in Uganda (East Africa).In one of the pictures you can see children making a pile of the made bricks to prevent them from getting spoilt; mainly by rain.

The Parents, teachers and pupil’s involvement to make these bricks, which are affordable to them, has been a positive sign and as a way of being appreciative to what our Roath Park friends did for SPACC. At SPACC we have told the teachers, parents and pupils that much as the work is at a stand still, there is great hope of moving forward and we will try any means possible to see to it that the situation improves. We have thus kept these people’s morale high not to get discouraged, some have thought we are using such tactics in order to lure children to SPACC .We have appealed to the parents and guardians that we will need their support when the building resumes although once in awhile you can’t miss getting a funny comment. One such funny words that the people here in Uganda use to imply promising something and you don’t deliver, is “KIWAANI” literally meaning that we promise air or we are corrupt liars. Recently one member of Springs Alive was making suggestions as regards the way we should be doing some things at SPACC and a teacher was heard retorting “KIWAANI”.The teachers were being advised to work with morale. Indeed at SPACC we have encumbrances in regard to having teachers at this centre given the fact that these teachers are paid very little money, many children at SPACC fail to pay the little money asked them and they cannot be compelled if they fail to pay, this continues to be a big challenge since there are no means yet to sustainably cater for this. Also where we have dug the foundation, there used to be a banana plantation, people have been heard saying that by now we would have ate the matooke that were slashed while clearing the site to set up the new classrooms. Such comments have existed because local people think that we use such occasions to entice more children to join SPACC.

Putting that aside, there is need for room to accommodate the ever increasing numbers of children that is presented at SPACC. When Roath park asked us to tell them how much it would cost to complete the building, we wrote a bill of quantity and posted it to them and we are of the hope that we will soon receive good news from them.

We have also requested our Roath Park friends to do what they can in order that at least a classroom can be built. We still have a promise from them, which we are still waiting for in order to quell the unrest of inquisitive people who we had given a lot of assurances given that we had great hope from Roath Park.

Before the Roath Park visitors came to SPACC, Springs Alive had not yet developed capacity even to show that we could use a video conferencing kit which was one of the items Roath Park people where to give us if we had electricity at SPACC and since the Roath Park people had previously sent to us an advance party, we are sure they must have briefed Roath Park back in Wales how insignificant we were. This gave us much food for thought and as Springs Alive the CBO (Community Based Organization) we have had to sort ourselves out and we’re sure if Roath Park people were to come back now they would be mesmerized of the encounters we have established.

It’s our prayer that at SPACC, we keep a good name with all our links wherever they maybe. May the good LORD bless you.