A few details about the school and our plans:
It is owned and run by a lady called Alice Kituku. She left a good teaching job to set up in Lindi as she knew it was an area with very poor schooling (I can certainly vouch for that). She started a little school in her back yard and then opened a nursery preschool when the numbers grew. In 2010 she bought some land about 10 km outside Lindi against th
e advice of her husband still harbouring her dreams. She has kept the preschool in the centre of town - 3 classes and so far has built 3 classrooms on the new land and is about to complete 4 more. There are pupils from Standard 1 to 4 being taught by 3 teachers plus Alice who fills in to give them a break. We like her because she is so determined and she supervises practically every brick being laid and guards the materials with her life. There is a lot of theft of building materials here if they are not supervised. Basically she makes the workers nail all the roof beams into place before they go home so that they are not easily stolen. She is also determined to make a good school. Our task (apart from fundraising) will be to introduce better methodology into the school. I hope to attract some primary teachers from UK and Europe looking for a challenge and maybe a career break or post retirement activity. They would be able to come and help alongside the current teachers for 3 months or more. We think it is worthwhile as she can operate beyond the constraints of government interference. I believe that the way forward for Tanzanian education is to create a beacon school in each area where teachers can see an alternative way of teaching which is effective. Alice plans to continue the school into secondary level and beyond! We are working towards creating a profitable school which can offer training to teachers and also some scholarships to poorer children in the town. I will also be looking for people in the UK and elsewhere to sponsor children. We have 4 sponsored children so far. They are enjoying an education they could not dream of otherwise. It isn't even approaching the quality of a satisfactory school in the UK but is the best Lindi has to offer. With your help, volunteers and donors, we are going to change that status. When we came to Tanzania we had no idea really where we would be concentrating our efforts. Here you are confronted by face to face charity needs on a daily basis and you have to take your time before finding the right cause. I hope we have found it with the Joy School.
