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July 2006

All posts from July 2006

In addition to supporting the school directly, we have encouraged the school management to use the possibilities they have in Uganda. We urge them to pressure the local government and UWA in order to get the support they deserve. The teachers are also eager to create a proper income source for the school. The tree-planting project was welcomed by UWA (see above). Another great concern of the teachers is the drop-outs. They have many ideas of how to make education more attractive. The first priority was the uniforms. Uniforms make the school visible in the community and the children are proud of being part of the school. After several campaigns at the Oslo Montessori School, the entire Primary School is now dressed in uniforms. The next priority was school material and books. The Montessori school has also collected a great amount of those, and we were happy to hand over 45 books after an additional generous donation by Gri Eid Moland.
In Uganda, schools also emphasize other activities like games, sports and music. This is extremely important to motivate the children to stay at school. During the visit of Marius and Lucrezia in March, the donation of footballs made the whole grade of P6 and half of P5 come back to school. These students had dropped out last year. According to the latest reports, they are still in school studying. Beside the school choir, the teachers have a great wish to teach music. In March the Montessori School donated money to buy music instruments. We look forward to the first concert! The teachers dream of taking the students to a music festival, and we hope to be able to support this soon.

During their visit in March 2006, Marius Koestler and Lucrezia Koestler saw that most of the technical equipment is still in good shape and has been well looked after. At the same time there was a problem of algae in the tanks because of too much sunlight. Also, because the water level in the Kazinga channel has sunk, the water inlet is no longer adequate. The water contains too much sand which destroys the pump. A second important issue is the community; even if the people in Katunguru are eager to help, they do not know how to properly organize themselves. During their visit, Marius and Lucrezia called for a community meeting and a water committee was elected. Their responsibilities are to reach out to the community about the importance of using filtered water, and to collect the contributions. They also have the authority to take decisions and responsibility to solve problems. The water committee is now working well and reports regularly to Oslo. Health has improved considerably in Katunguru since the clean water arrived, especially among the children.
The main problem at the moment is the water in-take in the channel. We decided that the most appropriate solution would be to dig a shallow well (up to 8m deep) close to the channel. With a visit by Lucrezia in July and a second visit by Marius in September 2006, this will hopefully be completed within a few months.

July 2006

Katunguru School Support

Katunguru Village Water Supply