There were five teachers, including the Headmaster, employed by the Centre in the Primary School Department, and a further two teachers for pre-school and baby class and two part-time teachers for grade eight class. There were 362 pupils enrolled in our Basic Education schools in 2003, 184 boys and 178 girls. The demand for places in various classes remains high. There has been a slight improvement in payment of school fees by parents.
26 boys and 20 girls sat for Government Grade 7 Examinations in November 2002. 83% of the candidates were offered Grade 8 places at Makeni Centre or elsewhere.
Adult Training Programme Our 2004 graduation ceremony is on the 10th of September this year. Academic results are available from Mrs Christine Allen on request. Another intake of adult students started immediately afterwards.
We are attempting to upgrade our software so that we can provide up to date training in computer literacy. This is proving difficult due to out of date hardware. If we are able to get computers that will run, say, Windows 98 and modern office software, we can make headway in the provision of proper computer training. Compuer literacy courses have proven very popular thus far, but clearly needs development.
Recently it was decided to introduce more short, intensive courses, including fish farming, mushroom production, batik making, and radio and TV maintenance. These have been advertised on Radio Phoenix and Radio Christian Voice. HIV/AIDS Prevention Project Report This project continued its activities during 2003, conducting focus group meetings, discussion sessions, home visits and individual counselling. We also regularly distributed informational, educational and communication (IEC) materials in rural and urban areas. We attended various workshops to keep up to date on matters related to HIV/AIDS/STDs. We facilitated the supply of maize, cooking oil and High Energy Protein Supplement to Saint Nicholas Village for AIDS Orphans donated by Project Concern International. We also distributed some protein supplements to vulnerable and malnourished children and sick clients in rural sites during the monthly outreach field trips.
Agriculture Department Report Sixteen families were settled in our settlement villages in 2003, half of them going to Chisamba and the other eight families to Mwomboshi.
The Agricultural Department introduced new techniques in demonstration plots to help settlement students appreciate different production and soil improvement techniques. We have also introduced a commercial demonstration approach. Through this we sold green maize, tomatoes, onions and carrots providing the department with an income of more than K250,000. Other commercial demonstrations involved ht growing of maize on improved fallow (450m²), irrigated maize (1,250m²) and rain fed maize (3,500m²).
We sold over 40 pigs within Makeni and to Master Pork (our biggest buyer at the moment). A few changes will be made soon to come up with a formula to enhance profitability for the enterprise.
The Mushroom enterprise performed better. The profits amounted to K301,700.
Website We hope you find the news items recorded here helpful in keeping you up to date with activities at MEC. If so, you may like to record your name as a Friend of Makeni. This entails no obligations, though we encourage Friends to make an annual donation of £15, $25 or K100,000. In 2004 we hope to have a “Mailman” type mailing list, allowing you to control subscription settings to an email newsletter (which will also be posted on the website) and to view archived news. The site availability may be erratic around June/July when a change of hosts is possible.
Yours in Christ, Fr Pierre J Dil / Founder MEC & Fr Andrew Mukuyamba
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