Each one should use whatever gifts he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace. 1 Peter 4 v 10.

The donkeys had been bought and they were now carrying water between well and village somewhere in Uganda. The school’s relationship with a missionary lady serving in Africa had come to an end following her retirement. The project itself had also come to a successful end. I had just taken over as headteacher of Hazlemere C of E School and was keen to establish a new link with a community in Africa.

Whilst considering this matter the school’s parent church, Holy Trinity, Hazlemere, became involved in a project running in Kenya called Amani. It was a Christian-run project that had Kenyan people working within their own community to support themselves, particularly to help young people, many of whom were orphaned by AIDS, to gain an education. This seemed like a God-given opportunity for Hazlemere School to get involved. After some discussion with members of the church a link was established with a wonderful Kenyan man called Kennedy. Through him, via a rather intermittent email link to Kenya, we were introduced to Masanga School and its principal Mr Ouma.

Masanga is in the west of Kenya. It is a typical small village of the area whose only link with the rest of the world is via a narrow mud track that becomes almost impassable to vehicles during the rainy season. There are no mains services such as water or electricity. The school building was a wattle and daub type structure that was in a very poor state of repair with holes in the walls and roof. Children crouched on the mud floors for lessons. The lucky ones had a brick to perch on. It was evident that there was a lot we could do to support the Masanga School community.

One of my aims when setting up a link between the two schools was that we should not be seen as merely a source of money, although fund raising would be important. Instead I wanted the ‘twinning’ to be relational. This meant having a proper dialogue between the schools. It should recognise that the experiences of the Kenyan children and their teachers had as much to contribute to any dialogue as those at Hazlemere. I was keen that the richness of Kenyan culture, the strength of faith, and wonderful character of the Masanga people should be recognised by the children at Hazlemere, rather than the one-dimensional stereotypical and distorted view which our media often portray of many African people.

We very soon set up correspondence between the two schools. There was no opportunity for video-conferencing or emailing so our children gained lots of practice at good old-fashioned letter writing. There was great excitement in our school when children received letters from newly established pen friends at Masanga School which, judging by the comments in their letters, was equally matched at Masanga when they got our letters from England.

We immediately encountered two issues that required resolution. The first was the mismatch between the ages of pupils sending and receiving letters. With different names for class groups usually numbered and the fact the Kenyans use a grade system that had older students remaining in a class until they achieved the required standard meant that some correspondence to, say, an English six year old may have been written by a 13 year old Kenyan. This was quickly resolved by filtering class mail packages and matching ages rather than simply class numbers. The second issue was that many children’s letters from Masanga included personal requests to send money or gifts. Again this was quickly resolved by agreeing that financial support and gifting would be made only by Hazlemere School as an institution. With these two matters sorted the relationship between the two schools has grown over the last five years. We have exchanged many letters and Christmas cards have been sent from each pupil at Hazlemere to those at Masanga. Many pupils send postcards to their pen friends whilst on holiday. Class books of messages and greetings are a regular favourite between both schools containing personal messages and photographs.

Over the years we have provided financial support of several thousand pounds to the school at Masanga. This has ranged from children’s individual giving, from their own pocket money at Harvest Festivals as we sought to develop an understanding of sacrificial giving, to the large sums donated by the audience of our annual Christmas concerts.

Gifts in kind have also been sent out including suitcases packed with pens, pencils and notepads, reading books for younger pupils, T-shirts and shorts, and several hundred pairs of flip-flops so that children did not have to walk around barefoot.

I will not dwell on it here but the contribution to our own school curriculum in citizenship, geography, R.E., art, craft, food technology, and multicultural studies has also been very significant.

Our church makes regular visits to Kenya and each year a group of young people spend three weeks there supporting the community and learning about them. It is absolutely fantastic that some of our own children, a few years on as young people, and some of our staff have been able to visit Masanga School, taking messages and gifts and bringing back stories, photographs, and videos for us to see.

With our support contributing to other sources of fundraising and expertise, Masanga school is now a very different looking place with well-built school rooms equipped with desks. The children there are still the same cheerful young people with a zest for life, a love of Jesus, and an eagerness to learn about our lives and to share their own experiences and desires with us.

I have just retired from headship but hope that this very special relationship between Hazlemere and Masanga School will continue to grow and flourish. Recently several other schools in Hazlemere and nearby areas have become involved with Masanga’s neighbouring schools. The project is really being blessed by God and is growing apace. The opportunities for such relational links between schools anywhere in the UK and those in Kenya, or indeed, many other part of Africa are enormous. Perhaps you or your school might consider getting involved too.

Peter Phelps

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