Building a Primary School in Zambia

I am so excited to announce a passion project of mine that has been in the works for the past few months. I will be founding and building a school in Livingstone, Zambia! I spent a month there last year and I will be returning this summer, from May until August. This time, I will be going on my own to spearhead this project from start to finish. My plan is to buy the land, build the school, furnish it with chairs, desks, whiteboards, and books, and then hire a local who can run it once I leave. From a distance, I will be overseeing and directing the operations of the school, while providing instruction to the headmaster who will run the day-to-day work.

This school will be special to me because it is being built in my mom’s name. She passed away in Sept. 2022 and when she was around my age, she spent just over a year in Zambia, teaching primary and middle school-aged classes. This is what inspired me to travel to Zambia last summer, and now to return for an extended period of time to found this school in her name.

I would love your support in any way possible, whether through financial contribution or prayers Everything goes a long way there - so any contribution, small or big, makes a huge difference!

In Zambia, schools are either government or non-government. The one that I was working at last summer (2023) was non-government and this one will be as well. With all schools, whether gov. or non-gov., students have to pay a certain amount to attend. For non-gov., this often isn’t much (ex. 100ZMK/5.15CAD) per month, but most families can’t even afford this. These students continue to attend school, but as a result of the lack of funds, the teachers often have barely enough to pay rent, let alone complete repairs, buy books, or even pay themselves. On average, in the Livingstone community, a primary teacher makes about $23 CAD a month. This means that they often resort to other means to make even a limited income. They will leave school early to go sell blankets, pillowcases, chickens… in the market far away from the school. They may be gone for days at a time, leaving the children without school until they return. I really want to be able to pay the teachers a livable wage and remove any worries for them. As such, I will be buying the land and then setting up a fund for them to be paid monthly. I aim to be able to pay them $50CAD per month x 3 teachers. I want to be able to guarantee them this pay for the first year that the school is open, and then determine where to go from there and the needs at that point. Supporting part of this would be absolutely amazing and would truly help to get the school up and running. This means a total of $1800 for the year for salary, in addition to the construction costs.

For project-specific updates, I have created an account for the school: @juliesprimaryschooloflove

If you have any questions or would like to hear more about the details of this project, please let me know!

Thank you so much for reading and for your support, whether financially or through prayers!

Update as of November 2024: costs to date - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vjT5kquVENF_n7sqR-NrhB5lZKe2chME9hmbHbFZLGQ/edit?usp=sharing