Powering Potential for Zambian Schools
Category : News
Sianyoolo is the local zone school. It runs from Grades 1 to 9 with a total of 600 pupils. The school received solar power in Feb 2017 thanks to a donation of panels by Solar Plants of Baglan Bay and other equipment funded by Hub Cymru Africa.
We saw Grade 9 pupils working on laptops preparing for practical ICT exams. This possible because they can charge them from the solar power.
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Our visit to Nashongo School was perhaps the most challenging so far. The ground is very dry and in parts it was like driving on soft sand. Our driver was not confident and kept getting stuck! Fortunately someone usually appeared out of the bush to help push.
The school catchment area covers 7 local villages with about 180 households. The local population survives by animal husbandry and growing staple crops like millet, maize and groundnuts. They also grow some cotton as a cash crop.
There was one school building, a teacher’s house, a water pump and pit latrine toilets. There were 331 pupils (164 boys, 167 girls) taught by 4 trained teachers and 4 volunteers.
Nashongo had had some problems with the solar controller but they had made the system safe until our arrival, only using it for charging. We were able to swap out the solar controller for them and check out the set up.
Thanks to the solar power, staff use laptops every day but their skills are mainly confined to looking up information and word processing. One teacher knew how to use spreadsheets. The unqualified staff were very much beginners.
As regards the Raspberry Pi, they had used it to access African story books on RACHEL. We updated their Raspberry Pi with a version containing the African Story Books in the local language Chitonga. We also left a power bank which they could use if they wished to teach outside in the school grounds.
Thanks to the Welsh Government Wales for Africa Grant Scheme which enabled this school to have at their disposal all the benefits of solar power – lighting, charging equipment and accessing wonderful learning resources.
Several of the schools where we have installed solar panels over the last few years are situated in the Chaanga area of Siavonga. As this quite a distance from the town, we decided to stay in a lodging house in Chaanga itself. The surrounding scenery was stunning.
It was an eye-opening experience. The room was clean and bed very comfortable but that was pretty much it in the way of amenities. The lady of the house made fritters from flour, salt, sugar and water to sell in the local market at an equivalent of 5p each.
Her children amused themselves by making bubbles by putting a hollow lollypop stick in the embers of a fire and blowing. Other children were working carrying water on their heads.
There was a local hospital with a maternity unit.
Category : News
On 12th June we visited Namumu School. Children at Namumu School, like most of the rural schools in Siavonga District, receives food from the Zambian Government in the form of maize. The schools pay someone in the local community to boil it and that provides lunch each day. There is a shelter behind the school where children can eat. There is still a high degree of malnutrition and stunted growth in the area.
On 12th June we visited Namumu School. This school has now been connected to grid power. The solar equipment was in place but had been sidelined and the cables disconnected. Due to the fact that the cost of electricity is a drain on school resources, we intend to install a grid tie inverter and reinstate the solar set-up to feed into their grid.
We were pleased to see that the Raspberry Pi was turned on and was being used to access African Story Books and Wikipedia for Schools in particular. They had two PCs from the consignments of donated machines we sent out but were using a laptop and teachers’ smartphones to access the learning resources. Pupils occasionally used RACHEL independently. With a router, Namumu School will be able to network the PCs and use them to access RACHEL too.
Staff filled in our questionnaire for the impact assessment we are compiling thanks to a grant from The Waterloo Foundation
Bbakasa is a remote rural school covering a large area stretching down to the Lower Zambezi. As such, it has many challenges. All the equipment was in place and since our last visit the school had received funding to add to the solar array. Unfortunately it had suffered a lightning strike and the solar controller/inverter had been damaged. We can not over-emphasise the need for earthing rods and lightning conductors in the construction of schools where thunderstorms are frequent.
Everything else looked OK and we hope to rectify the problems. The Head Teacher is well organised and his staff were familiar with RACHEL and had used the resources in their planning and teaching. We gave them an updated Raspberry Pi 3 B+ and an additional laptop. We were keen to get feedback on the impact of our project and teachers filled in our questionnaire. This part of our visit is funded by The Waterloo Foundation.
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Our second visit on 13th June was to Munyama School. We are carrying out an exercise to monitor our impact thanks to funding from The Waterloo Foundation. This is the Zone school for the area and takes pupils to Grade 9.
Like Manchamvwa Lakeshore it is difficult to access and best reached by boat. A grant from Hub Cymru Africa enabled us to supply solar panels to both schools in Spring 2018.
Everything was tidy and in good condition. We were very impressed with the Grade 9 pupils working on laptops donated by us and borrowed from Teachers. They were busy creating charts from spreadsheets and inserting them into presentation software.
Like other schools which teach older pupils, Munyama School has been given a very basic portable “science lab” to use in Grades 8 and 9.
We are pleased to report that since our last visit the school now has two large water storage tanks to store water pumped up from Lake Kariba.
If you would like to help us continue to support Munyama and other schools, please consider donating here
Category : solarpower , zambia
On 13th June we visited Manchamvwa Lakeshore School using the Office of the President’s boat.The District Education Board Secretary, the Resource Centre Coordinator and Human Resources Officer joined us. We also invited along Deana and Belinda from Friends of Monze to help us with our monitoring exercise which is funded by The Waterloo Foundation.
We provided solar power to the school in Spring 2018 thanks to funding from Hub Cymru Africa and were pleased to find everything in good working order.
There was an extensive garden on site where they grew water melons. The Head Teacher gave us a water melon to take for our lunch. He said he had consulted RACHEL learning resource to see how to grow them! We were pleased to discover the different uses that this resource is put to.
Category : News , solarpower
Today our monitoring visits took us to Kabbila and Namumu Schools. The Waterloo Foundation are funding this task.
Kabbila is a remote school which has been beautifully decorated by Hafod Primary School in Swansea.
You can see pylons from the school grounds but no power for them.
It was the first school in which we installed solar panels, courtesy of funds from University of Wales Trinity St Davids. They had looked after their equipment despite several changes of Head teacher.
There are many challenges for schools such as this but the community rallies around. The Head of the PTA was mending the milling machine while we were there!
Category : News , solarpower
Today we began our site visits to schools where we previously installed solar panels. This monitoring exercise is thanks to funding from The Waterloo Foundation.
Katalumba is on a hill overlooking Lake Kariba. The school has many challenges but as well as having large classes of pupils up to Grade 7, tries to cater for 8 children with a range of special needs. In the evening adults from the community come in for literacy lessons. Raspberry Pi with RACHEL can help with resources. We left them an updated version of Pi and a laptop to use to access the resources.
Game School also overlooks Lake Kariba. We installed solar panels in both these schools thanks to donation of the panels by Solar Plants in Baglan Bay and funding from Hub Cymru Africa. The panels are still functioning well and they are using the RACHEL resources. We left an updated version of the learning resources and also a laptop. Their classes are very large particularly in Grades 1-4, typically 65-70.
They have a football pitch and parents are cooperating to make a garden.
Category : solarpower , zambia
This morning we invited representatives from all the schools where we had installed solar panels to come to Siavonga Resource Centre. We wanted them to help us assess the impact of our project. The Waterloo Foundation has given us a grant to carry out the task of monitoring our impact.
We have installed solar panels in 14 schools in Siavonga District in liaison with the District Education Board Secretary (DEBS). Funding for this work has come from University of Wales Trinity St Davids, S & C Electric Europe, Hub Cymru Africa, The Waterloo Foundation and Welsh Government Wales for Africa Grant Scheme administered by WCVACymru. SolarPlants in Baglan Bay also donated us solar panels.
We divided into two groups and first addressed the issue of the impacts made by having solar power. The groups presented their findings to all attendees.
The most important impact of being given solar power was being able to run laptops with which to address the teaching of ICT. Schools also mentioned increased security because of LED lighting and the use of the school after hours for adult learning or for pupils to do homework.
The next question was concerning their use of the RACHEL learning resources.There were differences between the groups in the modules they used most. All used the African Story Books as there is a government initiative called Read Aloud encouraging daily reading. One school was interested in the Economics module as it gave information on entrepreneurship and setting up a business. In the communities served by all these schools, there is no formal employment. People farm or garden or run small businesses like shops.
