Students return from a life-changing trip to Africa

The college’s Trades4Aid project enables disadvantaged and disengaged young people from Brighton and Hove to travel to Africa to work on construction projects.

The eight students, who are on the college’s Pathways courses, aimed to improve their vocational and employability skills and spent a week in the remote village of Wasso renovating school rooms which were in an advanced state of disrepair.

During their visit to the country, the students also experienced the excitement of going on safari, seeing the spectacular Ngorongoro Crater and playing a football match with Maasai tribesmen.

Pathways teaching assistant Lisa Beresford, pictured left, said: “The welcome we got from Wasso villagers was unbelievable.

“We were amazed to see councillors, teachers, local dignitaries and Wasso’s oldest man who founded the village all turning out to celebrate our arrival with gifts and dancing.

“We were all incredibly moved by the gratitude and warmth we were shown.”

Student Steph Eldred said: “It was the best experience I have ever had. I want to go again and am determined to make it happen. I want to do more volunteer work before I become a teacher.”

Ms Beresford said: “Once the work on the school was completed, all the students were very proud of what they had achieved.

“There were lots of personal achievements and firsts – some of them had never flown before.

“They were all out of their comfort zone and took on the challenge and completed it successfully.

“They should all be very proud of themselves.”

For the trip, City College had joined forces with The Fonthill Foundation educational charity, led by Andrew Goodall.

The foundation contributed to the funding of the college’s trip, with the students raising most of the cost themselves through various fund-raising projects.

Mr Goodall said: “The Fonthill Foundation has been working with teachers, officials and villagers in Wasso to make a sustainable difference to the lives and education of school children in this remote area.

“We were delighted that the Pathways students were able to travel to help in our latest building project.

“They worked very hard with great results and I am sure they have also gained personal long-lasting benefits from their achievements.”

BACKGROUND

City College’s Trades4Aid project enables disadvantaged and disengaged young people from Brighton and Hove to travel to Africa to work on construction projects.

The ‘Pathways’ courses of these students are aimed at improving their vocational and employability skills to enable them to progress.

This year, Trades4Aid was offered the opportunity to travel to Tanzania to help work at a school in a town called Wasso.

We joined forces with The Fonthill Foundation, led by Andrew Goodall of Brunswick Developments. Andrew was keen to support students from our Pathways courses to experience a trip of a lifetime and The Fonthill Foundation offered to help fund part of the trip. The rest of the costs were fundraised by The Pallet Project, students fundraising themselves and support from City College. The idea of trip was to visit an area of Tanzania that Andrew and his family have visited before.

They had already started building relationships with the school in Wasso and were keen for the students to use the skills that they had been learning in college to support the community.

The project was to spend three days renovating the school rooms as they were in a state of poor repair by fixing the windows, filling, painting, and de-nailing wood that would be used for the windows. Andrews’ nephews Ben and Robbie were already out there working on the project as it was predicted to need three months of continual work. A container of donated school equipment was being shipped to the schools that The Fonthill Foundation support including another school called Lumo, which is very close to Wasso.

STUDENTS

The eight learners who were chosen to take part in the trip have attended City College Pathways courses since September. Pathways courses help learners to step up to a mainstream course with the college – something which wasn’t initially possible for them.

This could be for many reasons but we support them to be able to be confident to apply for a higher level course after attending Pathways. The skills the students had been learning were construction, sport and care so we made sure they had plenty of opportunities to use these skills while we were out there with building work on the school, sport with the students of Wasso and Lumo, and reading and playing with the children of the school.

THE WALK

While we were in Wasso, we arranged for our students to experience the walk that some of the Maasai children do on a daily basis to school.

They have to walk two hours there and back from the Maasai village, Boma.

So we all walked there and met a Maasai family – a chief, five wives and 34 children.

Some of our students played a football match with the Maasais which was an incredible experience as this was the first time the Maasais had ever played football before.

It lasted two hours and City College Brighton and Hove staff and students won 8-4.

CHALLENGE

On Thursday June 19, we started work.

Ben and Robbie explained to construction tutor Steve Wilkins what jobs needed to be done while we were in Wasso and gave all the students and staff of City College jobs where they could use the skills that they have learnt during their studies.

The students all were very keen to work and were helped by students of Wasso and other volunteers of Wasso town. They all worked in a team really well and helped each other out. Some of the jobs were very tiring but they all did their best.

Music was playing while they worked so lots of dancing while working made the days more fun than they already were.

Our students made great friendships.

We all worked really hard during the three days and some of the students didn’t want to stop.

We finished one room completely and any problems we encountered were overcome.

At one point, we realised that the paint rollers didn’t come with paint trays so Pathways Construction student Jack Haworth made some from wood and filled them so they didn’t leak.

JOURNEY

The journey to Tanzania lasted two days. During that time, the students experienced two safaris, viewed the Ngorongoro Crater and many sites that they would possibly only see once in their lives.

They embraced it all with wide eyes and gaping mouths and were amazed about the vastness of the landscape.

They took loads of photos and enjoyed every minute of it.

It was a very tiring journey but was well worth it.

ARRIVAL

We finally we arrived at the Wasso School on Wednesday June 18.

The students and staff welcomed us with open arms and loads of singing.

They had written all our names on pieces of paper.

Our students joined in with all the celebrations as if they had known the Wasso children for a long time.

As Pathways Sport student Zak Southwell said: “The first day was amazing. We were dancing all the time. They made us feel brilliant, it was awesome.”

There were many people who came to the Wasso welcome party – councillors, teachers, local dignitaries, and also Wasso’s oldest man who founded Wasso all those years ago.

We all received gifts from them as a thankyou for the work we were to do at the school. All of our students received the gifts by dancing their way to the front. It was amazing that they embraced a completely different culture so quickly.

Then we went to Lumo School to see what The Fonthill Foundation had done at the school. The welcome was again amazing.

All the staff and students must have spent such a long time practicing the routines that they performed for us.