Join Together to Assure Success

West Nile Schools Gain Access to Clean Water through Cooperation

Built in the early 1980s, the Ugandan rural school of Owere, is filled each day with 785 children between six and 15 years old, learning and acquiring new skills. Until recently, the children also had to walk down to the Nile River to drink water and fetch water for hand washing. Owere Primary School had no running water, and parents and teachers worried that that their children would get drawn in the river as they crowded around it to drink during rest periods each school day.

In April 2010, Water School began supporting a local community-based organization called Amor Child Development Centre in the Nebbi District to help bring community members and the primary schools together to solve problems surrounding safe water and sanitation and hygiene, in a participatory way. Each school debated effective strategies and, together with Amor and Water School, decided on a sustainable strategy and pooled their resources to develop a solution. Water School Programs were started in Owere, Pajobi and Puvona Primary Schools.

Owere Primary School was the first to begin and Oderocan Florence, the school mistress of the school was very encouraged with the collective response;

 

“We concurred that it’s better if we do it together as a family…. the parents volunteered to dig up and construct the pit latrines. My fellow teachers donated their time and effort to oversee the Water School Project; we divided the 539 enrolled pupils into 12 groups of 45 pupils. Each group was headed by a teacher. We came up with a schedule, every 2 school days; a one of these groups prepares SODIS drinking water for the entire school. It’s very effective, every child enjoys the exercise. The older ones wash and fill the bottles as the young ones display the filled bottles on the drying tables.  We solved a long-standing issue in a very short time.”

Water School provided the PET Bottles, drying tables, bottle shelves and materials for latrines and hand washing stations for the entire school.  Labor was supplied entirely by local citizens, most of them parents of the school children, who took turns constructing the pit latrines.

Florence was also encouraged by the increasing numbers of students. “It was like a time bomb to our school as children had to run to the river every day and, even so, not very hygienic.” “It was high time we did something about it. Now they have access to safer and clean water. We now boosts of 735 enrolments of pupils, with a great increase in the lower primary”.

Amos Openji, Coordinator West Nile Program, said that “Water School helped the community take the first and critical step and show us that we can do it and its better if we do it together…. Our community members donated their time and effort, and we solved a long-standing issue in a very short time.”

January 17, 2012

 

Dear Friends,

For ten years, Bob Dell and I have been working together to help bring clean and safe drinking water to children in developing countries. It is time to retire from our day-to-day activities with Water School and we have come to the decision to step down from our respective roles as CEO and President.  Both Bob and I are as strongly committed to Water School today as we have ever been. It is time for fresh ideas and energized leadership to take Water School to even greater heights and for us to spend more time with our families and friends. We will remain active in the organization through advisory roles, providing insight and encouragement as needed.

To lead Water School through this exciting time, we are pleased to announce that Tony Woodruff, a current board member, will take on the role of African Program Coordinator, and Richard Lau, a long-time board member, will direct our administrative and global fundraising efforts.  Both of these men are committed supporters and strong leaders with a clear vision for the future of Water School. It is an honour to hand the reins to them.

Along with vibrant leadership we are proud to see Water School with a growing group of enthusiastic supporters, including you.  It is because of your commitment to this cause that over 400,000 lives have been changed and children in desperate need of clean water are alive and healthy today. We are deeply proud of what we’ve accomplished and humbly thank you for being such a tremendous part of this growing organization.

As Water School moves forward, we will continue our support and hope that you will do the same through the monthly gift program. This program provides Water School with a steady and sustainable base, allowing us to focus on bringing clean water to more people.  To extend your support through a monthly contribution visit: www.waterschool.com/donate.

 

Yours very truly,

What a week! Our Water School trip to East Africa has flown by and today marks the final day of our two weeks here.

Since my last update there has been a whirlwind of activity with our friends from AWWOA leaving us and two long-time supporters, Sam Dennis and Lisa Moody joining us for the Ugandan leg of our journey.

On our second day of project visits, we met with our longest running partner, Christian Mission Aid(CMA) and visited a rural school of the Maasai people.  The Maasai are one of the best known African ethnic groups, due to their distinctive customs and dress and residence near the many game parks of East Africa.

The trip out to the school was an adventure in itself with Jacob, our CMA representative, commenting on the potholes saying “the roads could  hide an elephant!”  and a lucky glimpse at a herd of Zebras grazing in the field next to the road.

24 hours after leaving our home and native land,  our new Director of Fundraising, Jill Bridgman and I arrived in Nairobi, blurry-eyed but excited to start our two-week tour of Water School projects in Kenya and Uganda. The first leg of our trip started Sunday when we met up with CEO Fraser Edwards and board member Tony Woodruff and his wife who had already spent a week in Uganda and were brimming with stories of the amazing people they had met and the life-changing projects they has visited in their first week here in Africa.

Falling into bed last night, I was excited about seeing the work I have been learning about in the past 8 months since I began at Water School.

This morning we met with Jane Otai, our Kenyan country director who lead us through the two project visits and proved to be an invaluable wealth of knowledge, not only on the topic of water and sanitation but also on many issues affecting people living in slums.

Our first stop was in the Mathare Valley where we visited the Menno Kids Academy, a school with 400 students that live in the surrounding slums. Water School has been active at this school for just over one year and our impact is evident, not only with the SODIS tables that are set up in the schoolyard but also with the children’s energetic demonstration of proper hand washing!

We continued on about 15 minutes down the road to the public schools of Baba Ndogo and Chandaria where our newest partner Life Skills Promoters (LISP) began working only 4 months ago. The population at these two schools combined is almost 3000 students and is a using peer-to-peer training model where teachers train students who then become trainers for their friends and classmates. Here we got a real treat when the students preformed a song about hygiene and poem about SODIS that they had written. Two very catchy rhymes!

The schools of Baba Ndogo and Chandaria are funded by the Alberta Water and Wastewater Operators Association (AWWOA) and members Nancy McAteer and Larry Volk, along with his wife Linda, are here to see their contribution in action.  Everyone has been impressed by what is being done at these schools and the way that it’s changing the lives of these children.

It’s been a very long day I now look forward to sleep and tomorrow as we travel west of Nairobi to see Water School in rural Kenya.

- Melissa Payne

 

 

 

 

Baseline Hygiene and Sanitation Analysis:

• No basic hygiene and sanitation practices adopted.
• The compound is bushy and classes are in a sorry state.
• The pit latrines are rundown and dirty.
• There is no compost pit.
• Hygiene and sanitation practices need to be learnt.

This is school is an active Water School Project.

Click here to DONATE and spread Water School programs to other schools.

It was a long, hot, steamy and exhausting day yesterday (August 30). While we work in many difficult areas around the world, we are definitely dealing with a situation of incredible hardship here in the poorest areas of southern and western Dominican Republic. The cholera epidemic that spread in Haiti last year has now taken hold in impoverished areas in the south. It can be hard to believe this exists so close to North America.

Today, we visited a very large hospital in Santo Domingo and had a meeting with the director. It was a very good meeting where we learned of the serious damage that cholera and other water borne diseases is doing to the poor communities like those we visited yesterday. The cholera ward was standing room only. It is a public hospital and the only one the poorest can go to.

When cholera broke out last October the already difficult situation in Haiti was amplified; from chlorinating standing water, administering intravenous electrolyte solutions to the sick and disinfecting deceased bodies, we are continuing to work alongside our Haitian partners and responded to those needs. Over the last three months of 2010, Water School funded seven truckloads of supplies containing chlorine, cholera beds, IV solutions and other essential items. After the outbreak subsided, we learned that the number of cholera cases in the 24 communities where we had started teaching our program seven months prior, were substantially less than areas without our training.

In 2011, as we continue to grow and develop our work in Hispaniola, our program has also begun to evolve; transitioning from critical aid to long term, sustainable water, health, and hygiene solutions.

We will be posting a full report of the Dominican trip in the coming days.

The 2nd Annual Golf for Clean Water Charity Tournament at Deer Creek Golf Club, near Toronto was held last Thursday and was a huge success raising $15,000 for Water School projects in Africa and Haiti.

The weather was perfect with not a cloud in the sky as the 52 participants were treated to 18 holes of golf on a par 71 championship course. Golfers played a best ball format so the day could be enjoyed equally by both serious golfers and ones new to the sport.

Awards were handed out to the wining team as well as the “most honest” golfers and a bit of health competition was seen on the course during the “closest to the pin” and “longest drive” contests. Golfers gave generously for a chance to win a raffle prize from local businesses and $1,200 alone, was raised by auctioning off two West Jet tickets in an exciting live auction that saw two of the attendees in a heated bidding war.

The day couldn’t have gone better and Water School is especially thankful to our major sponsors PPX and Richardson GMP Torchia King Group who made this fantastic day possible!