In 1997 Jim Donnan went out to Kenya with fellow Rotarians from Horbury and Ossett Phoenix Rotary Club to see a school that had been refurbished by Rotary funds in a village called Gazi south of Mombasa in the District of Msambweni. This was a great success and several other schools were subsequently rebuilt.
In 1998 Jim took his family out to Kenya to visit the schools and his wife Rosemary visited a local church on Easter Sunday. At the end of the service the Rev. Francis produced some plans to build a Nursery School on church land. It had been his dream for many years to provide a chance of education to disadvantaged children in the area, and although this was a Christian church and most of the local children were Muslim, this school would be nondenominational. He had the plans but not the means to fulfil his dreams as the church members were all very poor. He asked Rosemary, as she was a teacher, if, when she returned to the UK, she could try and get the children in the UK to fundraise to build a Nursery School for the new Millennium.
On her return Rosemary and some dedicated members of St. Michaels Church Emley decided to take up the challenge. Rosemary talked in assemblies of several local Church Schools, and the fundraising group held several events. By the end of the year 2000, £5000 had been raised and the 3 class roomed nursery was built. Jim, Rosemary, Michael and Dilys (2 hard working fundraisers) went out to Kenya in 2001 for the opening ceremony. It was decided at that time that there was a need for a primary school after nursery, and some land could be purchased across the road for this. This would require fundraising for 1 classroom annually until all 8 had been built. At that time a classroom cost approximately £1500.
On our return six members of the church decided they would like to sponsor some of the poorest children .Initially, 6 children, who would not otherwise have gone to school, were chosen by the headmaster. Several people wanted to buy a desk inscribed with their name, and so 10 desks were purchased.
By 2009 all 8 classrooms had been built and there were 320 pupils. Class 8 had taken the end of school primary exams and had graduated to secondary school. A new School office and Administration block were opened by Dilys and Rosemary.
The next project is to build a library for the children and the local community and stock it with books. This we hope will improve literacy in the area and enable literacy programmes to be held for the many adults who have had no schooling whatsoever.
The following photographs show the buildings as they developed.
