Shingwa School - Project Update

In October last year one of our Trustees, Mathias Mbewe, cycled 136 miles coast-to-coast from Seaside, a small coastal town in Cumbria, to Tynemouth in 15 hours in wet and windy conditions to raise funds for Shingwa basic school near Mpongwe, Zambia.

As part of his commitment to the local community close to where he farms, Mathias teaches Maths and Science at Shingwa one day a week to grade 8’s and 9’s. The school is very poorly resourced with 600 pupils, and teachers employed by the government. The school has 2 x 2 classroom blocks and a single classroom building. One of the two classroom blocks is used by grade 8’s and the other by grade 9’s whilst the other two classroom blocks and single classroom are used for the primary school. The classrooms for the primary had no desks and pupils sat on the floor for their lessons. The classroom for the youngest children in the school had no desks and no concrete floor. It is an enormous challenge to learn under these conditions.

Mathias raised sufficient funds to buy 40 desks and carry out renovations to a nursery classroom. Each desk seats three pupils. Below is a photograph of Mathias completing his ride and some pictures sent by Mathias from the making of desks and classroom renovations to classroom and desks handovers.

Classroom before renovation

Classroom after renovation

Wood for desks

Finished desks

Classroom before renovation and new desks

Classroom after renovation with new desks

Handover of new desks

New desks