New building for Pre-school in Harare, Zimbabwe

Hello, I’m Lee Bond, and I’m teacher. I was born and grew up in Zimbabwe, but I have lived in the UK since 2003. Zimbabwe has remained close to my heart and I still have family and friends living there. I am raising money for a much-needed new building for this little preschool in Warren Park One township outside Harare, which serves families on low-incomes in the community. I have been involved with the school since its beginnings in May 2021, and I have known the teacher, Blessings Banda, since she was a child. Her mother was housekeeper, companion and carer to my late mother-in-law for 35 years. The whole story of Blessings’ school is told further down, if you’ve time to read, but for now, let’s get on with business!

The building is made of concrete slabs for walls, crudely plastered on the inside. The corrugated roof is made of asbestos, hazardous to health, and is held up by timbers which are ant-eaten and rotting. There are gaps where the walls meet the roof. The thin concrete floor is uneven and cracking up, exposing the earth beneath. It is very hot inside in summer, cold and draughty in winter, and the rain, which can be torrential in the rainy season, comes in through the door and water rises too through the floor. The floor becomes a muddy mess which needs mopping after every rainstorm, but the room remains very damp and a breeding ground for mosquitos. Moreover, the pre-school has outgrown the building, from having only four pupils at the start, and now twenty, with a plywood subdivision creating an additional class for ten Grade(Year)Ones. It is dark inside and has no electricity. Making tea and cooking lunch is done on an open fire outside. The playground is mostly bare earth, with patches of grass, and also becomes a mud bath in the rains. I hope with the money raised here that we can replace the building with a larger, solid structure with a concrete floor, with more natural light. We would like to level the ground outside also, and make a proper grassed field as a playing area for the children and for PE/games. We would also like to delineate the pre-school from the rest of the large plot which has other tenants and uses, with low brick wall, and make a paved area with benches for teachers, children and parents to sit.

I have supported the preschool from the start, along with the generous donations and contributions of educational toys, games, puzzles, books and art materials from friends and villagers in North Moreton, Oxfordshire where I live. With these, Blessings has been able to make a playground with swings and a see-saw, with the labour of boys in the neighbourhood, buy chairs and tables, and stock the classroom. There is even a little lending library. Posters and the children’s displayed work ‘paper over the cracks’ on the walls. I think it is remarkable what Blessings has achieved and she is widely respected for her dedication and commitment to the school and its families. She truly is a blessing to the community. Please read on if you’ve time.

Blessings worked hard to attain her Early Childhood Development teaching diploma while working as a teaching assistant in a state school and bringing up her three children as a single parent. The government pays teachers poorly, and sometimes not at all, owing to the mismanagement of funds and economic chaos, and Blessings did not have a reliable income to support her family. She decided, courageously, to start her own pre-school in the township where she lives. The school spans two school years for children aged between three and five years and acts as a crèche for one or two toddlers too. It shares its accommodation with another dedicated teacher (Grade One), Adreen. The parents, mostly workers in the city on small incomes, value pre-school education which is not widely available. Blessings charges a small monthly fee that includes break and lunch time meals and sports, and a termly development levy to go towards to school projects. Sometimes parents are late paying or can’t pay the full rate every monthand Blessings, out of the goodness of her heart, will drop the fee to what they can afford, or ask them to buy some groceries towards school meals instead. Parents buy school books and uniform - in Zimbabwe a smart uniform is a mark of pride and of taking education seriously. For such a small school, Blessings goes above and beyond. In a country where few children learn to swim, Blessings has organised swimming lessons at a local municipal pool . There is also ‘athletics’ - running and relays, races with egg and spoon, beanbags in hoops and running, which the children love, and they compete for fun with little schools in other townships. Parents and family turn out in force to support and everybody enjoys these occasions. Blessings also employs a part-time teacher for Visual and Performing Arts, and for IT which is now part of the National Curriculum all schools follow.

I hope you are as inspired by Blessings’ story as I am. I am honoured to be a part of it and it fills my heart with joy and hope for Zimbabwe when I see those small children loving school and learning so much.

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