WHERE YOUR MONEY GOES: Travellers' Donations to a Poor Community School

All our Projects in Zambia currently take place in schools and orphanages in Livingstone. But long before we began working with schools in Livingstone, we were approached by CECUP, a very poor school in Lusaka who were desperate for help.

The Jack CECUP Community School targets children who are likely to be denied the Right to Education because they cannot afford school fees or uniforms, because they are girls, because they are orphans, or because they have been abandoned. Since poverty is the common factor among all these categories, children at Jack CECUP Community School are not required to pay any schools fees.

While catering for children from the various categories, CECUP gives preference in admission to orphans, children of the street and girls. Because of the prevalence of HIV/AIDS and the extreme poverty, the school expects growth in the number and proportion of orphaned children that it caters for.

Ever since Travellers was approached by CECUP, we have supported them financially with donations and by paying school fees for the poorest children - and we will continue to do so.

THE HOPE PROJECT
“Helping Orphans and Poor children in Education"

Travellers Co-Founder, Phil Perkes, discussing how Travellers could provide support to CECUP School. The photo shows the size of the one-room school !!

TRAVELLERS SPONSORSHIP BENEFICIARY WINS 2007 INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN’S PEACE PRIZE - Jan 28th, 2008

Thandiwe Chama of the Jack CECUP Community School in Lusaka, Zambia won the 2007 International Children’s Peace Prize in a ceremony in Provincie Zuid-Holland, Netherlands on 16th December, 2007.

Since 2002, Travellers Worldwide has been financially supporting the Jack CECUP Community School and is very proud of its’ brave and influential student, Thandiwe.

The International Children’s Peace Prize is an initiative of the Dutch organization KidsRights and was launched in 2005 in Rome by the Nobel Peace Laureates headed by Mikhail Gorbachev. The Prize consists of a statuette – “the Nkosi” – and 100,000 euros, which are to be awarded to a direct aid project in the spirit of the young winner’s efforts.

At the age of eight, Thandiwe began lobbying for better school facilities after her school was closed because of a shortage of teachers. Thandiwe lead the 60 other children of her school by foot to find another school, demanding her right for education. As a result, all of the children were taken into the Jack CECUP Community School. She has since been fighting for the right to education for all children and began lecturing in churches on the dangers of HIV/AIDS and speaking out against corrupt officials.

Now 16 years old, she co-wrote and illustrated a booklet called “The Chicken with AIDS”, telling young children about the perils of AIDS. She also co-authored a song called “For My Sake” about the need for children to be supported and protected – a song which has already been played in South Africa, Tanzania, as well as the United Kingdom.

The Jack CECUP Community School educates children who are otherwise denied the Right to Education for various reasons. The acronym, CECUP, stands for Community Educational Centre for the Under Privileged and describes the target of the school.

Travellers Worldwide has been supporting the CECUP School for many years now, regularly funding many needs of the school including the full cost of education for 10 children per year, books and other educational aids every semester, shoes for all the children, food packages that the children can take home and give to their families and the roof for two new classrooms. Travellers has also paid for two children to go on to college. Travellers continues to support the CECUP School and is looking forward to seeing the school continue to educate children and establish new initiatives.

Thandiwe Chama with her “Nkosi”

When we started supporting them, CECUP had one school room of approximately 12 x 16 feet for 500 children. The children have lessons in rotas for groups, each group getting a two-hour lesson, then they have to leave the school and the next group comes in. Some lessons take place outside sitting in the dust (there are virtually no trees or greenery). Every time they received a little money, they put it towards trying to build another two classrooms.

Travellers' on-going support:

1. Every year we pay for 10 children's education and have done this for the past few years. Most of these children have lost one or both of their parents and would have had to drop out of school completely. Now they have a better chance of a career and earning a higher salary than they would have had. (See photo below). We're currently planning to substantially increase the number of children we can support in this way.
2. We have paid for the roof for the two new classrooms, plus some other structural parts, and since then they have received various sums of money from us towards improvements.
3. Three times a year, for each semester, we donate money for books and other educational aids for all the children.
4. We also donate funds to buy shoes for all the children.
5. We have also paid for two children to go on to a college.
6. We have paid for a group of teachers and children to attend workshops in South Africa entitled “Creating A Safe World For Every Child". The workshops were mainly on children's Rights and responsibilities as well as HIV/AIDS and how children could effectively participate in the fight against the pandemic. On this trip they were able to meet with South African Government education officials and at the same time do some fundraising for much needed equipment and support.
7. We provide funding to buy the children some food packages that they can take home and give to their families.
8. Every year we pay for a party for the children - this came about because the children and teachers take one day to have the Phil Perkes Memorial Children's Fun Day, celebrating our Co-Founder and also to show their appreciation for what we have done for them. We chose to provide food and refreshments for the children on that day because we don't want the school to be burdened with any cost. It also gives us an opportunity to provide the children with additional food.

Delighted kids showing off their very welcome food parcels that were distributed to all the children to take home to their families


Kids with new Travellers sign

Some of the children who have received free education from Travellers

"I do not know how I can best describe the joy and gratitude these students have."
Wiseman Banda, head of CECUP School, talking about the students whose education Travellers paid for.

"The PHIL PERKES MEMORIAL CHILDREN`S FUN DAY is a Day that has been set aside in memory of the PHIL PERKES who is the founder of Travellers World Wide (TWW) of the United Kingdom and operates in sixteen countries across the world. He died in August 2003, barely two months after the current Executive Director, Co-founder and wife Jennifer, had visited us in Zambia.

Mr. Wiseman Banda, The School Coordinator for Jack CECUP Community School, welcomed the couple at the Lusaka International airport in April 2003. This was after over a year from the first contact. After three days of stay and discussion on possible ways of establishing the TWW Project, they left to have another stop over in Zimbabwe then South Africa before they left back home in the UK. 

Unfortunately, Phil died in August 2004 when he was expected to revisit us in Zambia. The news of his demise was a very shocking and disturbing both to the children who had fallen in love with the newly found friends and the members of staff.

However, thanks be to God that Jennifer did not forget the visit to Lusaka, Zambia, but kept the spirit burning by supporting the initiatives established with Jack CECUP Community School.

A LITTLE ABOUT OUR SCHOOL
The official name of the school is JACK CECUP COMMUNITY SCHOOL. The acronym CECUP stands for
C = Community
E = Educational
C = Centre for the
U = Under
P = Privileged

This tells of our target group. The school targets orphans, which includes the single orphans. These children ones have lost at least one parent. The double orphans are the ones who have lost both parents and those who have both parents alive yet are unable to meet their demands and cannot enroll their children in either government or private schools.

In other words, our school is a self-help school regally registered with the Zambian Ministry of Education as a service school. It is run by local volunteers who offer their time to give these children a chance to learn. It is a way of giving hope to the hopeless children.

TARGET GROUP
There are three types of children in school whose age range from six and half to 16years.

• NEVER BEENS: These are children who had no chance to be in a Government School before and are the age they could not be accepted any more due to age limit.

• DROP OUTS: these are children who failed to proceed to junior secondary or in any other grade due to a number of factors among them lack of school uniform, shoes, books, pencils, etc.

• PULL OUTS: These children were once in Government or private schools and where forced out due to the lost of the main breadwinner or parent who used to sponsor them. Some had their parents die due to HIV/AIDS or natural death, had their campaniles closed or privatized, etc.

The school started with 32 children and now has 256 girls and 226 boys making the total of 482 children. The school has a number of activities which include, football, netball, drama, poetry, Choral music, cricket, cultural dances, Anti AIDS Club, Anti Drugs Club, Environmental Conservation Club, Child Rights Club, Book Club and other traditional games. The school also has one school computer for children.

Many thanks go to Travellers Worldwide management and staff for all the support rendered to the students and the school at Large. We look forward to your continued support in the effort to educate the need young Zambians. It for sure gives an excuse to celebrate and hope for their future knowing that someone somewhere is concerned of their innocent lives.

We shall continue sending and submitting the reports which are purely children’s write-ups and that they represent the true reflection of the child’s mind and opinion.

One again, from the entire school team, we say Thank You TWW management and staff."

Wiseman Banda (centre) with teachers and some of the students

The start of the extra two classrooms for CECUP school. Unfortunately, the classrooms are on two different sites, but three classrooms is much better than one!

Adding the new roof to the school - gratifying forward progress.

Free books and pencils - the smiles say it all.

My name is Joe Mwanamwambwa. I am male and 18 years old. I was born on 1st January 1986 at the University Teaching Hospital in Lusaka. I live with my mother. I have two elder sisters and three elder brothers. I am a real Zambian. I come from the Western part of Zambia. My tribe is Lozi and I love my family very much.

I like to listen to the news because we hear a lot about our country and the world. My favourite sport is Cricket.

I first started school at Lilayi basic School a Government school in 1996. In 2000 I stopped at Lilayi Basic School because of money for school fees and I stayed one year at home without going to school.

In 2002, on 4th January, I started school at Jack CECUP Community School until I wrote my Primary school leaving Examinations. I passed my grade seven examinations and now I am at Chimwemwe basic School a government School. I have just finished writing my final examinations.

I like English and science subjects very much because I want to be a Doctor or a journalist. Am fighting very hard to go to grade ten the senior Secondary schools. I believe I will do it.

What can stop me not continue school is lack of money for school fees, shoes, books and uniform. Thank you very much for your support. though we don’t have anything to give you but to say that may the Almighty Father give you more than this.

Please, please, don’t stop here to help us as until we finish our school and help those who are still coming as former students of Jack CECUP Community School.

May God bless you for standing in as our fathers and mothers.
 

The child or children you support will write to you to thank you directly (if you'd like them to) and you can keep track of how they're doing at school - you won't regret helping them.

Thank you very much.

Africa is all about hope and colour!