Wema Children’s Centre
A Kenyan Covid-19 Emergency Relief Project
Project Details
Basic Dignities provided Wema Children’s Centre, a boarding school in Bungoma, Kenya, funding to purchase emergency supplies during the Covid-19 pandemic. The school was temporarily closed during the pandemic to protect the children. Like many governments across the globe, the Kenyan school board put social distancing and other health requirements in place for the school to reopen. Because Wema serves as a school as well as a home for almost half of the 500 children they educate, this posed a serious threat to the well-being of many of the students. To help the school reopen as quickly as possible, Basic Dignities raised funds to help cover the cost of items needed to help the school reopen safely.
To assist with social distancing, the Kenyan school board required each student to have their own desk. The desks needed to be six feet apart. Since 2-3 students typically shared a desk, this meant that Wema school needed significantly more desks than they had. Our funds covered the cost of building new desks. Local materials and workers were used to build the desks to help their economy.
Face masks were also required by the Kenyan school board. Our funds were used to purchase face masks for the students and staff.
Our funds were also used to purchase hand sanitizer. Because clean water is a scare resource on campus, water in not always available for washing hands. Hand sanitizer allowed the students and staff to keep their hands clean when soap and water was not available.
Cost Breakdown of Covid Relief Donation Items
Wema students wearing their face masks to prevent the spread of Covid-19 when social distancing is not possible.
Wema students using their new desks to social distance during class.
HOW IS WEMA PLANNING TO PERMANENTLY FIX THE CLEAN WATER PROBLEM ON CAMPUS?
The campus currently used a well and small water treatment system to obtain clean drinking water. However, when there is no electricity in the community, the pump cannot run. This prevents the children from accessing the clean water in the well. To combat this problem, Wema school has teamed up with Engineers Without Borders - Chicagoland Professional Chapter to install a solar-powered pumping system. To get more information about the project, learn about other projects happening on Wema campus, or to make a donation for the solar water project, please visit https://support.ewb-usa.org/wemachildren .
