Dear friends and family,
we are back in the civilized life, enjoying flushing toilets, food and hot showers. We would like to provide you with an overview of the main results achieved during our stay. This was all possible due to the huge support received from you back home, so a big thank you to you!
Toilets (teachers and students)
Description: To meet the requirements of the ministry of health, we build toilets for the students and the teachers. It offers six doors for girls and 3 doors plus an urinal for the boys as well as two separated cabins for the teachers.
Status: Teachers toilets completed including doors and lockers, students toilets are finalized with five cabins per sex ready to be used.
Investment: 2000 Euros
Fence
Description: The school area was fenced to fulfill the requirement of the minister of education.
Status: completed
Investment: 400 Euro
School books
Description: We bought one sample of school books (student book and teachers guide) for every subject for every grade as reference for the teachers. In addition, exercise books to hand out to needy children were bought as well as additional books (e..g, dictionaries, reading books and HIV education books)Status: completed
Investment: 500 Euro
Additional class rooms and school desks
Description: Two new temporary classrooms were built to split different grades that used to share the same facilities. Both classrooms were newly furnished with additional school benches and are now being used.
Status: completed
Investment: 1700 Euro
Roof for current school building
Description: The roof of the old class rooms needed to be made waterproof by adding additional iron sheets on the roofing.
Description: The roof of the old class rooms needed to be made waterproof by adding additional iron sheets on the roofing.
Status: completed
Investment: 50 Euro
Gate
Description: A gate has been built to increase the security of the school properties
Status: completed
Investment: 150 Euro
Land purchase
Description: Enough funding was raised to buy the remaining rented land equaling to 2.4 plots (1 plot being 100x50 feet). Total land belonging to CBSM equals 5 plots.
Status: completed
Investment: 3900 Euro
Water access
Description: Water access has been provided in form of a water tab to allow school members to wash and drink.
Status: completed
Investment: 240 Euro
School uniforms
Description: School uniforms are mandatory for school kids in Kenya. We bought 24 uniforms to be handed out to children that can't afford buying their own.
Status: completed
Investment: 120 Euro
Others
Description: Kenyan economy very often works without recites. Around 1000 Euros were spent on little investments like labor (500 Euros), school equipment like cupboard and office desks (300 Euro), other little investments, like nails, tea, sand paper and others (200 Euro).
Investment: 1000 Euro
With your help we have achieved all of what was planned for 2011 and 2012. THANK YOU for your support to transform a hut into a proper school.
We have further plans to improve the school, this includes:
Permanent school buildings:
Replace the mud school buildings with a proper permanent school facility using proper bricks and cement. Cost estimate around 30'000 Euro (including office)
School kitchen:
The school requires a school kitchen to cater for student lunches and snacks. Currently, the school cook (an elderly volunteer lady) cooks at home and brings the food to the school. A stove on the ground big enough to cater for 250 children could be as cheap as around 250 Euros, however, we would prefer to build a proper school kitchen with running water, brick walls and a non smoking oven. No cost estimates available yet.
Continuity for Kimilili
One of the main questions that we got after returning home was: "How is continuity ensured in Kimilili now that you are gone?"
The answer is as simple as "CBSM members!" Already during our stay, some of the CBSM members were extremely helpful, motivated and trustworthy. To quote one of them that said: "The face of CBSM is undergoing a huge change and I'm proud to be part of it!".
Some of the achievements since we were gone include:
Head teacher:
A new qualified head teacher was hired and introduced new processes and methodologies to improve the quality and standard of the school.
Teachers' Training:
The two teachers that will start teachers' training (ECD program) in April registered themselves and compiled a list of all requirements (e.g., school uniforms, school books and other materials)
Account:
As the current account is located in Nairobi with no branch in Kimilili, access to money is difficult. A new bank account is to be opened, however, as it is for an organisation, the process to open it is complex and time consuming. However, the process has been started and awaiting approval of the district head officer. As you can see, the CBSM members did the handshaking and visitor books all on their own... :)
Students’ toilets:
When we had to leave Kimilili, the toilets were not finalized. The toilet builder run off and disappeared for several days. CBSM members hunted after him and convinced him ("including strong arguments like involving the police") to finalize the construction. Toilets are completed and being used.
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| Thanks to our CBSM friends for your continuous support! |
To ensure that the progress made over the last weeks can be maintained, continuous funding is inevitable to cover the monthly costs occurred by the school. We would like to thank Matthias & Anita, Jürg & Rebecca, Kaspar & Julia, Andy, Wolf & Ursula to agree to cover parts of the monthly run rate.
We miss Kimilili, the big smiles of our CBSM friends and the 250 big brown eyes. We will go back in December 2011, let us know if you want to join! The more hands, the better!
If you have any questions, suggestions or feedback, please feel free to contact us on:
or just come and talk to us. We are sure you'll see the spark in our eyes when talking about Kimilili! :)
All the best!
Alex & Agnes
