Poly Project

Janet had received a donation last year from Polytechnic School Lower and Middle school students, the school she went to when she was a girl and where her mom and Luc’s aunt currently teach. The kids there sold popsicles to raise money for our school here in Mozambique. Kids here frequently sell home-made freezies, but they didn’t understand how Janet’s school was able to raise over $300. It’s probably because they only charge 3 cents a popsicle here. Janet originally wanted to build a sports court for our school with the money and everyone was very excited, but after various months of failed efforts we realized that is not a realistic project. People just don’t really understand how to build basketball hoops here and we don’t have any skilled cement workers available to refurbish the crumbling surface left behind by the old Portuguese gas station. Instead we’re going to use the money to finish the administrative block at our school which has been standing half complete since we started working here in 2009. It’s not as exciting of a project as a sports court, but it will house offices for our principal and vice principal, who currently just conduct there business in the teacher’s lounge, create a space for our school library, and provide somewhere for the distance learners to meet when they come in to do their tutoring and testing. The money has totally revitalized the project and all kinds of work is now going on at the school. One of Janet’s 10th graders is doing the masonry, one of our teacher colleagues is installing the wiring, and we just saw three of our students walking to campus with doors on their heads, so those are probably being installed as we write this. Our Vice-Principal has really come through to make this happen, negotiating good prices on all the materials and work, something we really hate to do since we have no idea how much something like a door frame is worth here in site. Plus he’s kept a record of every single purchase, down to the last nail, a practice which is so important in a system where money often disappears. Our kids can always find somewhere to play soccer, so even though they don’t get the sports court there will be no lack of physical exercise here, but finishing this school building will really help the academic life of our campus, something which is so important for a community with so few academic facilities available.