School year ends in Sohm

Much of our attention this year has been spent in driving forward, with Rotary, the Sukuta school renovation project - about which more, later. 

But we haven't forgotten our friends in Sohm, the first school with which we worked in The Gambia. Although, for COVID reasons, we were unable to visit the country this year, we have been able to make an impact, as a result of the generous donations we have received from our supporters and sponsors.

What follows is a brief summary of some of our impacts over the last twelve months. 

We have assisted the school in getting anti-COVID supplies to it, including hand gels and a range of face masks and shields, as the photos below illustrate:

We supplied the staff with a new laptop computer, on which they have been able to keep the school's COVID records. Thankfully, there have been no incidents at the school.

We have maintained our annual stationery order to the school, whereby we are able to provide all materials the pupils and staff need for the whole academic year.

We introduced electricity to the school about five years ago, and gave a commitment that we would pay the running costs(fortunately no heating bills to incur!). Here is a receipt, for about £9, for the quarterly charges, we have been happy to support.

Regular readers will know that our biggest project in Sohm, to date, has been the construction of a large, multi-purpose, assembly hall last year. We are delighted to report that it continues to be well used, both by the school and the local community. Below are photos of one of the regular assemblies and, excitingly for us, pictures from an inter-school debating contest the school was able to host in the hall, recently.

The hall is the main community assembly room in the village of Sohm, and is used for a range of local events, such as the women's assembly shown below. We have encouraged the school to adopt a charging policy for these lettings and have offered to match fund the income they receive from the lettings, to supply enhancements to the hall and school. 

As a result, we have been able to purchase an additional 100 chairs for the school, a PA system (which many of those letting the building have asked for) and some much needed ceiling fans for the hall. This great partnership working has improved facilities in the school and strengthened community relationships and ownership of the hall.

From the UK, we have maintained our relationship with fellow British charity First Aid 4 Gambia and have ensured that there has been further first aid training and supplies given to the school. Many thanks to our Scottish friends for this. In the spirit of improving first aid facilities, we have also upgraded the beds in the sick room, which we restored a few years ago.

So, it's been a difficult year, because of COVID, but we feel that - even at a distance - we have been able to continue our support to the Lower Basic school in Sohm, thanks to the continued generosity of our family, friends and supporters. On behalf of the children in Sohm, we would like to say a very large Thank You to you all! 

Meanwhile, our major pre-occupation this year has been progressing the Sukuta project, which, with great Rotary assistance, we are attempting to oversee a major renovation of the Sukuta Lower Basic school. It has over 2,000 children and is the country's largest primary. 

There has been a slight delay in progressing this, as the Rotary annual budget for supporting projects such as ours was exhausted earlier than expected this year. However, the new Rotary year began on 1 July and we were encouraged to make a grant application for this new year. Which we have done! 

Without wishing to sound too confident, we look forward to being able to announce significant progress with the project within a month or two. 

Thank you for reading. Your continued support is important to us, and is vital to Gambian youngsters.

2nd July 2019 - a red letter day for Sohm

Tuesday 2 July 2019 was a great day for Sohm, although few in the village would have known it, at the time.

It was on that day that the last piece of funding fell into place and we were able to sign off the cost schedule and timeline for building the new hall and kitchen for the Lower Basic school. This was a project that we had labelled Sohm 2020, two years ago, as we set about raising £20,000 by 2020 for the project.

We are ahead of schedule and hope to be present for the opening of the new facility in January next year!

Architect's plans for the new hall -
to be complete by the end of this year!

The building will be our most significant contribution to the village of Sohm - by some distance - since we established the charity eight years ago. It will replace an old school dining hall, which had to be demolished, because it was dangerous two years ago, with a brand new facility. The previous building - over 35 years old - was inflexible. Its "furniture" consisted of immovable concrete blocks, which children perched on to eat from other concrete blocks. The school kitchen had no modern equipment.

Village elders and school governors,
after a session planning the layout and
location of the new school hall, in January 2019

The new building - 30 metres long - will be multi-functional. In addition to being a dining hall - , because we are acquiring flexible, portable furniture - it can also be used as a gym, an assembly hall, a prayer room, and the village's first community village hall. Village leaders have played a significant role in helping to design and decide the location for the hall, as shown by the photographs. They have been overwhelmed with gratitude at the generosity of our supporters.

Above: the decrepit (and now demolished)
building the new school hall will replace. Below: its
 roof, that was in danger of collapse

Our charity has been assisted by a number of individual donors, whose efforts have helped us reach our funding targets so rapidly.  We thank them all - you know who you are!

In addition, we have received huge support and assistance from two major organisational donors: Beech Hill community primary school, in Luton and Redbridge Rotary club. Sohm Lower Basic school has shown its recognition of their efforts on the freshly painted walls (funded by these donors!) in the main teaching block (see photo).

Redbridge Rotary and Beech Hill's logos,
outside Sohm LBS head's office, by way of
appreciation for their fund-raising efforts.

We have covered the activities of Beech Hill school in a number of posts (see above) notably for their splendid and highly successful Gambia Days.

Tuesday 2 July, however, was - in addition to our signing off the contract for the new build - a big day in our relationship with Redbridge Rotary Club. It was the hand-over day from one president to another.

Outgoing president, and friend of our charity, Tony Betts, presented two awards to SSS in his farewell address. One was a cheque of £1,000 to us - as one of his nominated charities for the year. The second was a prestigious Certificate of Appreciation from Rotary International for charitable work we undertake in The Gambia, putting some of the funds that they have raised to such good purposes. We were greatly humbled by both awards.

John and Sandra (centre) from SSS, receiving the
 Rotary International Certificate of Appreciation
from Tony Betts (left), immediate past president,
 and Mike Bell, incoming president of Redbridge Rotary 

The Rotary International Certificate of Appreciation

We would, very publicly, like to put on record our immense gratitude to Redbridge Rotary for its generous support to us over each of the last four years - and we look forward to its continuation.

We promised the club, in return for their support, to return next February with a short video of the opening of the new hall, for which they have contributed so much, to support.

The old kitchen's cooking stoves

"Furniture" in the old building, which
 made it unfit for multi-purpose use.

They, like Beech Hill, and all of our generous sponsors really have helped transform young African lives, in ways in which it is difficult to appreciate from the comfort of our homes in the UK.

Thanks, one and all - onward to 2020 and the opening of the new hall!