New toilets for school
Children in a Kenyan primary school now longer have to go off into the bush when nature calls.
A toilet block has been built at the Sosoni primary school where in the past, 450 children shared just two toilets.
Money for the work came from secondary school pupils from Lakelands Academy who held fundraising events from cake sales to non-uniform days.
The money, £780, was handed over for the Kenyan Schools Project, a charity run by Bill and Lynn Morris from Oswestry.
Mr Morris said: “The year nine pupils at Lakelands, under teacher Mr Ian Crilly, have been raising money for our Kenyan Schools Project for many years."
“It is great that the teenagers do something for children in Kenya and also they can see where the money they raise goes.
“The work has all been done by builders in Kenya. Now the toilets are finished there is a plaque saying that it had been built thanks to Lakelands Academy.”
The Kenyan Schools Project has donated everything from paper and pens and hundreds of desks to classrooms toilets and even the electricity supply to schools and orphanages.
Bill and Lynn visited a school during a dream holiday to Kenya in 2004.
“We didn’t know that this visit would go on to change our lives forever,” Bill said.
“The school was called ‘The Mkwakwani School’ and when we saw what the children had to put up with just to go and learn, we were so shocked. The children were sitting on concrete floors, barefoot and having to share pencils, paper and books. After seeing the school, which, at that time had 1,500 pupils aged between three and 13 years, we then met the headmaster and his deputy and promised we would try and raise some funds for them upon our return to the UK.
“The trip to the school really got to both of us, and we could not stop thinking about the children. We were going to keep our promise.”
The couple returned to their then home in Ellesmere and Bill who then ran a mobile disco, put on an event to raise some money for the school.
They made £500 and used it to buy pens, paper and other supplies. They decided to see if they could sponsor some desks and from there things snowballed until in 2004 the Kenyan Schools Project was launched.
Now the couple run a shop in Bailey Street in Oswestry to raise funds for their charity.
More details about helping the charity are available from the shop or the website, http://www.kenyanschoolsproject.co.uk.
