We came to the end of term II 2017 on 25th August 2017 and all the children have gone home for 3 weeks holiday. It was made possible for us to reach this day only because of the extra support from LAP to help provide for us food for the whole school in the last week. Once again we do appreciate you Mr. President and your team for always coming to our rescue in times of desperation.
School Enrollment
We had an increase this year on our enrollment and the attendance has been fairly stable compared to the previous year with an average of 300 children. One challenging part has been the number of teachers that we have been forced to have at least two extra teachers for nursery and primary section. So at the moment we have 4 nursery teachers and 7 primary teachers. The impact of this has been great in terms of academic performance; however, the negative impact has been on salaries which have been difficult leaving us with outstanding arrears of 1,900,000 UGX hoping to settle next term if all goes as we planned.
Meals and Fees Payments
The management of the school has set it that parents bring in maize and beans for feeding children on top of the fees. A few of the parents were able to meet the requirements but the majority were not able to bring up these requirements majorly because of unstable rain pattern and worst of all was pests that attacked maize plants at a very early stage. This was one of the reasons we appealed to you towards the end of the term for your support on feeding which was going to force us to close the term earlier than expected by the school commission. Thank you so much for coming in with the help.
Electricity
With the help of LAP the school now has a step-down transformer proving electricity for the whole school. It is remaining extension of power to the dormitories and the sick bay as we do not have enough underground cables to reach those building. Hopefully we will close on this in your September visit.
One outstanding challenge with the electricity here is its inconsistencies; by the time we were closing the term till now, it has lasted for 2 months without electricity because of heavy rains that has thrown down electricity poles everywhere. So having no standby source of power, it is still quite a big problem. This would require a generator or solar energy.
Bore-hole pump
For the first time we had the pump serviced with support from LAP and it is doing just perfectly well and giving out sweet water as usual. Thank you LAP for this pump for without it, it would have been just impossible to run the school.
Examinations and Assessments
There has been a lot of improvement in our assessments of the children in terms of giving out Tests, Assignments, Homework and Examinations ever since you brought for us a Printer. This has reduced the cost of photocopying which was far much expensive before. We now only refill the cartridge and this can serve for a while. At the moment this Printer can serve perfectly up to the end of the year but possibly by next year as we expect more children, the volume of the work will be too much for it as we plan to acquire a bigger copier.
Buildings and Constructions
A lot has been done this year with your support, the school has completely changed. What was a bush about 3 years ago is now like a city; a sickbay, dormitories for boys and girls, P.5 classroom just to mention but a few.
Up-coming Events
The school will organize the Second Annual Graduation ceremony next term late November. This is one of the major activities that markets and advertises the school so widely. It is a moment for teachers to display/exhibit what has been done throughout the year to the general public. I still appeal to you Mr. President and LAP to support us in this mega event.
Conclusion
Once again, thank you so much Mr. President, staff of l-a-p, the entire organization, sponsors and the entire donor community for every single coin you drop to transform the life of a child in guaranteeing a future for this children.
I pray that the Lord will bless you, the works of your hands and shine His face upon you.