News Update - May 2008

Following various delays, largely caused by the weather, the Education Department has now confirmed that the Australian Primary School at Shaibu/Nogwe will open its doors to its first students on June 23.

In the meantime, the Australian AIDS Fund Inc has bought the school a large piece of land to be used for its sports activities.Once its existing crop's been harvested, a community workforce will clear and prepare it for the school.

News Update - March/April 2008

We're into the home straight...just two weeks out from the start of the April 2008 Second Term...and then the Australian Primary School at Shaibu/Nogwe will be operational......alive with hundreds young and eager children and their parents!!!

It got to the stage that the bricks were going up faster than the photos could be flashed back to Australia...because priority is given to the building rather than the race to put the photos into cyberspace!

The rich green rural environment has quickly given way to the sprawl of the school buildings construction.

News Update - March 2008

A sign of the times!

The roadside marker for the Australian Primary School for the Shaibu/Nogwe villages becomes the focus for the local children as they cluster around the workmen at the school site.

Ther walls of the various buildings are steadily rising as the rains ease.

Now the building pace will pick up!

News Update - Mid February, 2008  

Excitement is mounting  in the remote Nogwe/Shaibu area as work proceeds on the construction there of the Australian Primary School -Nogwe.  

Here's the latest picture parade:-

School Signpost	The Village Headman Shaibu	School Kitchen

Some of the prospective pupils	Staff Office	Classroom block 1

Classroom block 2 [ far left, Rabson [in blue) with  two journalists	School block 1	Rabson addressing a meeting with village leaders and students.

	Staff Toilet pit - Foundation wall

News Update - February 2008

Despite solid rains across Malawi which have wiped out crops and made roads treacherous, the work on The Australian Primary School project at Nogwe is forging ahead.

School Ofice building	Boys toilet	School Kitchen building

Girls toilet	Classroom Block No 1	Classroom Block No 2

News Update -January 2008

Despite the Christmas/New Year holidays, work on the Australian Primary School at Nogwe is bounding along. The five double toilets for the children were the first priority...followed by  Staff Office....and the teachers' toilets

Measuring up and digging the various toilet pits	Working out the Staff Office foundation profiles	The teachers' toilets

Girls' toilet pits	Digging office foundations	Sand..ready for mixing

Staff Office foundations	Delivering the bricks	Boys' toilets

Some local houses		More toilet pits

Community meeting discusses the school works	RABSON AND VILLAGE HEAD	Builders at work

Building the school signpost	Collecting the sand	Building the school sign

Women of the Noigwe community celebrate the start of the school works, having brought sand to the site	Zex with workers at the brick-making oven	TOC Secretary,Rabson[right],Village Headman [blue vest]and Zex Thambo[left ]

The Australian Primary School at Nogwe

Some of the houses near the proposed school project	Mr Rabson, Secretary of the Tithandize Orphan Care Centre visiting thhe project site.Rabson standing in front of the project site	project site view

project site view	A typical local house at Nogwe	Local community inspect the project site

community on the site		Community meets onsite ahead, of project work beginning

The new school at Nogwe will cater for some 400 children aged between 4 and 9 years old...some of them with parents,some AIDS orphans living with grandparents, some orphans in child-headed households and other vulnerable children with single parents etc. None are presently capable of walking very long distances and able to cope with the various hazards enroute....child traffickers, roads, bridges,rivers, flood areas. Although children are expected to walk up to 2 kilometres to school, the children in the Nogwe area are currently faced with walking up to 17 kilometres if they want to go to school.

In this new project, and in an area where up to 75% of the local population are illiterate,The Australian AIDS Fund Inc will be working with the Tithandize Orphan Care Centre, headed by Zex Thambo, and headquartered at Ndirande. The Australian AIDS Fund has already partnered Mr Thambo's community-based organisation in vital projects at Ndirande.

Presently, parents and others who send children to distant schools face the following danger:

• Children vanishing on the way to or from school,taken by child traffickers
• Children washed away...drowned by swelling water rivers
• High rate of school dropouts caused by early marriages,pregnancies,child labours in houses in towns or in tobacco farms and tea estates, drug abuses,etc
• Hunger and malnutrition
• Punishments due to late arrival at school because of far distance travel
• Sicknesses on the way to or from school as a result of being tired, hungry ,thirsty,or sunburn.

ABOUT NOGWE /SHAIBU VILLAGES

This is one of the areas where the Tithandize Orphan Care Centre is serving the orphans, people infected by AIDS/HIV,and the wider vulnerable community etc

This area is one of the areas where people live primitively, with no easy access to local education facilities, medical,developmental facilities ,no secondary school and where HIV/AIDS information has been very scarce, resulting in high rates of HIV infection.

EXISTING SCHOOLS AND HOW FAR…..FROM SHAIBU / NOGWE

• Mthuruwe…………..17 KM
• Pambachulu…………15 KM
• Nkanda………………20 KM
• Kolokoti……………..10 KM
• Kambenje……………20 KM

The new school will be known as The Australian Primary School - Nogwe