School Links - Lockerbie Academy and Thawale Primary School

We are delighted to say that we have linked our school with Thawale Primary School in Malawi in Africa and we hope to build a strong partnership with this school over the next few years. You will see from the core information that this school has almost 1200 pupils yet only 9 teachers and faces daily problems that would not be encountered by a school in Scotland.

We hope to be able to develop strong links which allow our students to gain a greater insight into daily life in Malawi while encouraging communication between individuals in both the schools. Developing Global Citizenship is a key aim of our school and this link will be a vital way in ensuring our students have an opportunity to develop skills in this particular area.

Our initial short term aims are to set up pen pal letter schemes, to provide some jotters and basic stationery and to set up an area in Thawale for a library. Our long term aims are to set up an exchange programme for pupils and staff and possibly the wider school community. We would welcome any suggestions about how the link should develop. Please contact me at loffice682@ea.dumgal.sch.uk.

Mark Turner

Photograph of Thawale Primary School, Mulanje District, Malawi

The Scotland Malawi School Improvement Project

The Scotland Malawi School Improvement Project was initiated in early 2006 as part of the special relationship between Scotland and Malawi, which goes back as far as David Livingstone. In November 2005 His Excellency Dr Bingu wa Mutharika, President of the Republic of Malawi, visited Scotland and signed a mutual co-operation agreement with The Right Honourable Jack McConnell, First Minister at that time– as a result, Link Community Development began its work in Malawi. LCD has been working in Dedza District since early 2006 and Mulanje District since February 2007.

Map Showing Location of School

Malawi is a landlocked country in southern Africa. It borders with Zambia in the north west, Tanzania in the north east, and Mozambique in the south. It is a very beautiful country with widely contrasting scenery. In the east of the country, running up to the borders with Tanzania and Mozambique, is Lake Malawi (formerly known as Lake Nyasa). It is one of the largest inland lakes in Africa, covering roughly a quarter of the country.

In this region the climate is hot and humid for most of the year, and people often earn their living from the lake or from growing rice. Further west you find very mountainous scenery, where the climate is warm in the day but cold at night, and crops include potatoes and maize. Mulanje is at the foot of one of the highest mountains in southern Africa, Mount Mulanje, which is 3001m high.

Malawi is known as the Warm Heart of Africa, because its people are so friendly. There are many different ethnic groups co-existing at ease in Malawi. The most common languages are Chichewa and English, with other local languages.

Malawi is one of the poorest countries in the world. A recent survey found that more than half the country's population continues to live on around 16 pence a day. The survey found that 6.4 million people, 52% of Malawi's population, were living below the poverty line, while 2.7 million (22%), were experiencing ‘ultra-poverty’ whereby they "cannot afford to meet even the daily recommended food requirements". Most of the poor are in rural areas in the southern and northern parts of the country. A key contributory factor is its very young and rapidly expanding population. With 60% of its 12.3 million population aged under 20, according to one 2005 estimate, "more than half of the poor in Malawi are children".

The Government is focusing on education as the way forward out of poverty. In 1994 it adopted the policy of free, universal primary education for all children. The response has been amazing, but it has posed new problems for the Malawian Education system. There is a shortage of qualified teachers, and classes can be extremely large.

LCD’s project in Malawi is based in two educational Districts; Dedza and Mulanje. Dedza is in central Malawi, just south of the capital Lilongwe. Mulanje is in the southern part of Malawi, 65km south east of the commercial centre Blantyre. Both districts were chosen for the LCD project because of the levels of poverty in schools in these areas and the lack of other agency support.

Thawale Primary School is located in the Chitakale Zone of Mulanje, around 5km from the Mulanje administrative centre. The school has joined the Link Schools Programme because it is keen to learn from its partner school in Scotland.

Mr Muwawa, the headteacher, is responsible for monitoring the quality of teaching and learning, creating timetables and ensuring that there is discipline at the school. The school has a dedicated team of teachers who have worked together to build up a strong team.

Mr Muwawa, the Headteacher in his Office

The headteacher believes that the sharing of knowledge and experiences between the two partner schools will enhance professionalism, he also hopes that linking will improve his administrative and professional skills which will in turn make his workload lighter. Mr Muwawa has been a headteacher for a long time and he works hard to achieve his goals by making sure that teachers report for duties and checking with the teachers on the punctuality of the learners.

Regarding the partnership, some teachers said “we are really happy to link with a school overseas as there will be an improvement in teaching and learning strategies”. Mr Kainja, one of the teachers further commented that linking will enhance the professional relationship between Thawale teachers and Scottish teachers. The deputy headteacher said that linking ‘will assist both teachers and learners to achieve an improvement in social and academic standards’.

Learners at Thawale enjoy going to school for a number of reasons; Davies likes his school because of the dedication of teachers to their work, Mary likes Thawale School because it has electricity which makes it unique from other nearby schools. "Our school has electricity and computers and this makes me like my school because I know for sure one day I will have an opportunity to type and print using a computer." Thawale receives student teachers from Blantyre Teachers College every year who come for student teaching practice. "This year, we have received 8 trainees and they have reduced the teacher pupil ratio with a great percentage." Pauline commented.

Behaviour of learners at Thawale is not an issue as most learners report for class every day and the teachers try their best to report for duty every day.

Learners at Thawale explained some of the challenges they encounter at the school including the shortage of teachers which creates a high staff to pupil ratio, the lack of school library and notebooks and the lack of feeding programme at the school.

"During the dry season, the school doesn’t receive piped water because the source becomes dry and this makes us travel long distances to fetch water. This leads to some learners missing their first lesson." Davies said.

One standard 8 learner said that young learners leave their class because of hunger. Nearby schools are part of a feeding program run by the World Food Programme which provides learners with flour for porridge in the morning, however Thawale is not one of the beneficiaries, which means that some learners from Thawale sometimes leave early school to go and get porridge from a neighbouring school.

Thawale Learners: (From Left to Right) Philip Munlo (Standard 8), Maria Solomon (Standard 8), Davies Chidule (Standard 6), Pauline Robert (Standard 5), Joyce Livala (Standard 7) and Clement Muyebe (Standard 7)

Mary, a standard 8 learner said that she anticipates the lack of school notebooks to be a problem as she is taking many subjects and needs to have enough notebooks. Thawale School does not have a library and Phillip feels that, “having a library at the school will assist us to read several books which will enable us to get selected to go to secondary schools."

During the interview process, learners of Thawale explained what they want to do after completing their education. Davies wants to be a General Manager and he likes learning English, Mathematics and Chichewa (the local language). Mary wants to be nurse and her favourite subjects are Science, Social Studies, Life Skills and English. Phillip wants to be a doctor, he’s interested in Science, English and Mathematics. When she is older Pauline wants to be a Member of Parliament and her favourite subjects are English, Mathematics and Life Skills. Joyce wants to be a nurse and Clement a Minister of Education.

Thawale School has dedicated and energetic members of the school community as School Management Committee (SMC), Parents Teachers Association (PTA) and Village Development Committee (VDC) members who work in collaboration for the success of the school. There have been many achievements at the school thanks to the tireless efforts of all committees and their members.

Some of the notable achievements are the employment of three security guards to prevent theft from the school property which is necessary even though the school is well built and fenced and repairing the structural damage.

"Last year, all the roofs of our toilets were blown off by wind and we decided to repair the toilets. We also worked on the maintenance of pipes that bring water to our school from the mountain" Lawrence Ndiopaizi said.

Community Leaders of Thawale: From Left to Right: Lawrence Ndiopaizi (SMC Chairperson), Lucius Palichina (PTA Chairperson), Verena Kabichi (PTA Member) and Jenny Michenga (SMC Treasurer)

Lawrence also said that SMC, PTA and VDC committees, with assistance from the community members and chiefs have collected sand with the aim of building teachers’ houses. One of the major challenges at the school was the shortage of teachers; the school has only two teachers’ houses and as it is based in such a rural location, without enough accommodation on site the school is not able to attract enough teachers to work at the school. A further issue is there are 16 classrooms at Thawale but only 8 are being used due to the insufficient numbers of teachers to fill them. An additional challenge highlighted was raising funds to pay the monthly salaries of the 3 guards.

The committee members said that they welcome forming a partnership with a school in Scotland and they hope the link will develop the school and the community.

In standards one to four the medium of instruction is Chichewa, once pupils reach standard five all their lessons are taught in English except Chichewa (the native language). Pupils at Thawale Primary School learn Mathematics, Chichewa, English, Science and Technology, Social and Environmental Studies, Agriculture, Religious Education, Bible Knowledge, Music, Expressive Arts and Life Skills.

Standards of attainment at Thawale School are very high. In the 2006 ‘Primary School Leaving Certificate’ exam, the school achieved a high pass rate. In 2007 the pass rate was

96.3% and many learners were selected to attend secondary schools. During the recent Primary School Leaving Certificates exam results, Thawale School managed to send many learners to national, government and community day secondary schools.

As part of the extra curricular activities, learners play football and netball, they are also interested in volleyball but the school lacks resources for this. Music is popular and there is a school band and choir.

Members of staff at Thawale Primary School have suggested the following potential areas that might form a basis for their link with a Scottish school.