A School in Africa. A perspective for the future.

St. Stevens Secondary School, our “School in Africa” in 2023, is a ray of light on the horizon for young people in the Kasantha region, because currently no secondary education is available to the more than 4000 children and adolescents who attend the ten local primary schools. Construction is scheduled to begin in May 2024.

The nearest secondary school is 12 kilometers away, and it can only be reached by foot. This is especially difficult for girls because they are often bothered or sexually harassed on their way to school. In addition, it is difficult to perform well after a two-hour walk to school. The 2023 Africa Runners raised a sum of €110,568 with which we will open four classrooms, build two accommodations for teachers, install toilets, dig a well and set up an administrative office.

Our project partner is Mwawi Shaba, the education officer for Karonga diocese in Malawi. Educating children and young people is dear to his heart. His own experience has taught him what a difference a good school education can make in the lives of young people. With the Karonga diocese, the Umckaloabo Foundation has already successfully founded several primary and secondary schools.

In the rural parts of Malawi, there is a great need for good schools. A proper school education that is accessible can be a way out of poverty and dependency, especially for girls from poor families who often have to help at home and are frequently married off at an early age.

This is why Pastor John Moyo in Mzuzu worked with the Umckaloabo Foundation to expand St. Mary’s primary school so that more girls could get ahead in life. New additional classrooms were built. Vegetable gardens and fruit trees helped create a more diverse meal plan for the children at St. Mary’s and many other of the 260 primary schools in the Mzuzu diocese. Another important building block is continuing education for the teachers. We bring dedicated teachers together within a network and offer them further input through workshops or coaching.

Northern Malawi is one of the least developed regions in the world. Schools and hospitals are usually so distant as to be completely inaccessible. Children and teenagers have to help tend the fields; girls are often married off early. Bishop Martin from Karonga wants to open up a brighter future perspective to the younger generation. He is convinced that education is what will help youths have a chance to shape their later lives.

In Livingstonia, a secondary school with a boarding school was created so that even children from remote rural areas have a way to receive a good education. Thanks to the first round of financing from the Umckaloabo Foundation, the first classrooms were built in 2020 and the first students could begin attending classes. The contributions of the Africa Runners allowed us to finish construction and open the school in 2022!

The Ekuphumleni Secondary School in Whittlesea was opened in 1979 under the apartheid government, and for many years it yielded only mediocre educational outcomes. Lizwe Ngalo, a dedicated teacher who died in 2020, became principal in 2005 and gradually shaped the culture at the school so that over time its teachers and students came to know a better way of teaching and working. In the meantime, the school has produced much greater results despite difficult conditions. With his enthusiasm and discipline, Lizwe Ngalo accomplished something magnificent!

Initially there were 800 students in Whittlesea but now there are 1400, so the school desperately needed new classrooms. Thanks to the help of the Umckaloabo Foundation, these classrooms were finally made available in summer 2022. The Foundation also helped arrange for important teaching materials for computer courses and other lessons.

The Northmead Secondary School suffers from chronic underfinancing. It receives only minimal state subsidies, and there is an above-average number of nearby families who often cannot pay the school fees. As a result, the much-needed renovation projects at the school came to a standstill.

At Northmead, we were able to build new bathrooms, acquire books and other classroom materials for classes, and we replaced the ant-damaged wooden cabinets with metal ones. This means we helped establish a better setting for students to learn and supported the school in maintaining its high graduation rates in the future as well.

With the help of the Franciscan nun Loice Kashangura, in 2017 we started building the St. Francis and Clare Secondary School in Lusaka, Zambia. The school opened in 2019, and now every year 750 children from the Chipata Compound outside the nation’s capital have an opportunity to take classes and complete a school education that will open doors. After construction was finished, we were able to take on other projects with Sister Loice, such as setting up solar panels so that the students had an independent source of energy.

Many young people whose families cannot afford tuition can still attend school thanks to our scholarship program. 

The Umckaloabo Foundation launched its “A School in Africa” program with the St. Ignatius Secondary School in Nthalire, Malawi. With €66,000 in support raised by the Africa Runners charity run – which was also held for the first time that year – the Karonga diocese was able to build a secondary school with a boarding-school facility. In this very poor and remote region, the new school acts as a light on the horizon for many young people who otherwise had no way of attending a secondary school.

Thanks to our scholarship program, even children from very poor families who cannot afford to send their children to boarding school can now have a chance to become educated.