Why does Konno Town need a new school?

Konno Town is in the Western Rural District approximately 20 miles east of Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone. In this area, although there are several junior schools, when children graduate to secondary school they currently have to walk up to 5 miles (each way) to the nearest available secondary school. In a place without the 'school run', with no school buses, high poverty, low bike (bicycle) ownership, this is tough on the students, particularly if their walk to school is through unsafe areas. This is a serious barrier to accessing secondary level schooling.

Statistics from UNICEF in 2022 show that only 64% of children finish primary school (age 11); 44% lower secondary; and only 22% complete upper secondary education. 30% of women (girls) are married before the age of 18.

How will it be built and run?

'Alan's Africa' has just purchased half an acre of land in Konno Town to build the new secondary school. The cost of the plots, surveys, documents and provision of essential tools for the contractor has come to £3,200 which has already been funded. The community, in recognition of the work we are doing building a school for them, have donated a further half acre of land, giving us an acre in total, which we will develop in due course to provide additional facilities.

The picture above shows our plot, with the wooden posts you can see marking out the boundary.

Solomon Kamara, who I have known for 10 years, is the former headteacher of Liverpool Secondary School (Freetown) and Solomon has decided to move on to this exciting challenge of setting up the new school and will be the school's General Manager, as well as being the project manager of the building programme for me. We have a headteacher and several staff who have already expressed interest in taking positions at the school.

What is a community school?

The school will be a community school and will therefore receive NO government funding. In Sierra Leone there are government schools (where students receive free tuition and staff are paid by the government) and there are community schools. There are not enough government schools, or school places, for children in Sierra Leone so community schools are ESSENTIAL in providing access to education. Parents have to pay for their children to attend classes (generally about £10 a term) and teachers are paid from the tuition fees.

The build

The school will be developed in 3 phases initially to provide the core facilities:

1. Phase 1 (this fundraiser) - to build a single block containing 2 classrooms and a small office / staffroom.

2. Phase 2 - to build a toilet block.

3. Phase 3 - to extend the block by adding an additional 2 classrooms.

The build cost for the WHOLE project, completing the 3 phases, is £15,500, of which we need to raise £7,250 for this initial phase 1. I have already raised £3,150, with immense thanks to The Doris Field Charitable Trust for their very generous £2,000 grant, so we are now looking to URGENTLY raise the remaining £4,100 needed to get Phase 1 built. The rainy season in this area starts in May and rainfall is significant so this phase needs to be finished by the middle of May and if funds permit and we are able to move onto Phase 2 it would be very beneficial to also complete the toilet block (£2,500).

If we surpass our fundraising target the surplus will be carried over to Phase 2, and then Phase 3.

EVERY £ raised will go directly to the project. I have NO admin or other support costs. (Just Giving takes a very small card processing fee but I have a donor who will kindly fund this cost).

What will the school be called?

The school will be named Westminster International Community School in recognition of all the support I have received over the last 10 years from Westminster Group PLC and their charitable foundation . The Westminster name additionally has a personal significance for me as I attended Westminster College, Oxford - now the School of Education at Oxford Brookes University - for my teacher training. Although I left teaching to pursue other goals the importance of education has been of primary importance in all of my projects in Sierra Leone and I always remember a Nelson Mandela quote, "Education is the first step out of poverty".

I would like to say:

About 'Alan's Africa'

'Alan's Africa' is an approved project of the Rotary Club of Banbury but is very much my personal project. Since 2007 when I started working directly with community schools, 'Alan's Africa' has funded the building and equipping of 41 classrooms, many together with accompanying facilities such as toilet blocks, water harvesting, handwash stations. We have also built a basic science lab, a library, 9 classrooms have been fitted with electricity, school textbooks supplied, sanitary products to help girls access school, we have sunk and refurbished wells (6 in total), distributed countless uniforms and football kit, built accessible accommodation for a severely disabled teenager and his carer, and more.

If you have any questions please get in touch . I'm also available for talks about all of the work I have undertaken in Sierra Leone. You can find me on twitter @alansafrica

Finally, the photo below shows a classroom block we built at Banbury International Community School in Freetown, to show what our new school is going to look like.