Meet Home of Hope

 

Home of Hope, below Mchinji Mountains

Home of Hope sits below “Mchinji Mountains” - a government Forest Reserve stretching up from Mchinji town and marking the border with Zambia. I love looking at those hills. Look down from the peaks, and you see the plain of Mchinji district stretch away, dotted with remote villages and farms blessed with water from the hills. I put the camera drone up this morning to enjoy some views from above without the sweat of the climb!

Next year will mark the 25th Anniversary of Home of Hope. From just one house for the Chipetas, their ten orphaned grandchildren and ten other orphans, it’s now a huge campus - a village, actually. Houses for the “mothers” and younger children in family units, dorm blocks for older children, Nursery, Primary, Secondary and Vocational schools all on site, with accommodation for administration staff and a growing number of teachers. That’s not all. There’s an on-site clinic, which since Covid extends care to people from the surrounding area as well as the Home’s children and staff; a maize mill processes crops from the Home’s farms, and serves the local community. I could go on.

Turns out we’ve not been looking Malawian enough as we walk around the site ;). This morning Mrs Chipeta sent Ruth, Phil and I something more appropriate to wear! (I’ve no idea if it explains my shirt, but links between Malawi and Scotland are deep, long and continuing.)

Our main focus for today was to learn about progress and needs at the Home’s schools. We’d aimed to meet staff from each of the Vocational Training College (VTC) and Secondary and Primary schools, but we ran out of time and will meet Primary school staff tomorrow afternoon.

Rev Chipeta took us first to see work underway on accommodation for VTC teaching staff. The foundation layers are made of bought-in bricks, but the blocks for the main walls are made on site.

In addition to the one underway, five more staff house are need. They cost $20,000 to build. This one is progressing after a recent donation from the UK in response to the Chipetas’ 70th Wedding Anniversary fundraising drive!

We then moved on to meet staff at the Vocational Training Centre. We were met by the instructor for Tailoring and Fashion Design, Sarah Kalanje. “It’s good to be a designer,” she explained. “You can be self-employed and independent.” A motto of Home of Hope is “Infancy to Independence.”

The VTC offers practical courses that include bricklaying, carpentry and joinery, metalwork, and construction.

The students weren’t there today when we visited, so we’ll go back tomorrow to see them at work.

The Principal of the VTC took time to talk with us about needs. “We have just one vice for metalwork, and no woodwork vice at all - just for example. We lack many basics. In the past the Malawian Government used to give each graduating student of a practical course a toolbox with what they need to do their trade. This has stopped.” 

When I visited with a group of teenagers from Christ Church, Bedford in 2019, we saw the beginnings of two new VTC buildings. These are now topped-out with typical “iron sheet” roofs, but stand empty. “These are our machine shops.” Anthony pointed to where the spindle lathe will be, and the band-saw, the stand drill, the three-phase power supply. There’s no end to the vision.

At the Secondary School we met new Head Teacher Edgar Kambwiri. The picture was similar here. “For some subjects we have not one text book. Not one.” It’s difficult to hear. We asked about milestones that might be realistic. “Of course to have curriculum materials for each subject we teach is the first one. Then we need copies in the library for students to access. Then copies the students can take away for private study at night - something like one between two.” When we asked more about the library Edgar explained that some copies of books have been lost because the windows are in a poor state of repair. “It’s too easy right now for books to be taken without permission.” He has a ticketing system in mind, but we saw the windows and they do need some TLC!

“Of course we understand it’s a question of limited resources and competing priorities. When the boys’ toilets need repairing, for example, that is going to come before windows and doors.”

A team of ten teachers are responsible for the Secondary School’s 258 students. Some subjects, like English, are taught to the entire year group: that’s a class of 84 for Year 2. 

“We need more staff.”

Beyond the need for text books, at present the Secondary School has no working computers of any kind. No printer, no photocopier, no projector. “We have to track student attainment and progress manually. And we can’t present some teaching resources to them, which often require technology these days.”

Inspite of these difficulties, we found all the staff we spoke with to be positive and “can-do” as they make steps towards improving things. On Thursday morning Ruth and I plan to film an interview with Edgar and his Deputy Head Teacher, Charity Chiota - and if there’s time with the VTC Principal, too. We think there will be people who hear their story of perseverance and commitment to their pupils, and want to help.

Charity (Deputy Head), Phil Janes, Edgar, Ruth Janes, Austin Dama (Head of Humanities), Alex.

This evening before dinner we set about unpacking the cases, re-marshalling the various categories of items we’d split between the bags to reduce the risk of losing “everything”. We had fun shining the torches we brought for the Home’s security guards up into the dusty night. Even through the haze of smoke from wood fires around the village we could clearly see the Milky Way, as crickets sang the start of night.

Phil says I have to include a picture of me writing this post!

Good night from us all here.