frican Revival have finished building a new 2 classroom block at Kalomo Central Community School

Children outside the new classroom block

In September 2012, African Revival completed work on a double classroom block and store room at Kalomo Central Community School, in Zambia. The addition of this new block will greatly ease the accommodation pressures of a school catering for almost 900 children.

Kalomo Central faces a number of challenges in providing a quality education to children in the area. One of these has been the severe overcrowding of over 900 children into just 7 classrooms. The problems this has caused include a reduction in available teaching time as grades are split into three sessions,  low motivation amongst staff and reduced health and safety standards.

This project will immediately benefit both the pupils and teachers of Kalomo Central Community School. It is expected that the new classroom block will greatly increase learning standards and teacher morale, whilst raising the awareness of the plight of the school to the local District Education Board.

The classroom situation

With almost 900 pupils spread across 9 grades in only 7 classrooms, the school was unable to accommodate all grades at one time. By constructing a classroom block consisting of 2 classrooms, each grade will now be able to have its own classroom and lessons will not need to be staggered throughout the day.  Encouraging attendance at community schools in Zambia is difficult enough, as children are more likely than the national average to have parents or guardians who did not attend school and come from vulnerable backgrounds, and when pupils from within one family attend school at different times and for different hours, absenteeism and low morale amongst pupils can rise drastically.

Building the new classroom block

The Solution

African Revival pledged to increase the number of classrooms at Kalomo Central Community School from 7 to 9 which would allow each grade to have its own classroom and subsequently increase the number of hours pupils could attend school.

Additionally, a store room inbetween the new classrooms can be used by teachers as an additional office for planning lessons and marking, thus increasing the morale of teachers and standard of learning at the school.

It is expected that by supporting Kalomo Central Community School through infrastructural development, African Revival will develop a lasting relationship with the school. Additionally, this project will inspire the community to keep working hard to achieve the overall goals of the school as both outside communities and the government will recognise them as being successful in their plight.

The completed classroom block