If we raise £3500 each year, we can send some of our teachers to Uganda and bring some of theirs to Bristol. Through exchange visits, teachers learn from each other and as a result children's education improves.
Our School Council voted to split funds raised for Red Nose Day between Comic Relief and our Uganda fund.
Our Cushion Sale raised over £500.
Our Team Cake Sales on Friday afternoons raised over £600.
Our Music Evenings were an absolute sellout and raised over £1000.
Bristol Masindi Partnership is a local charity that was established in 2006 to advance the education of young people in Bristol and Masindi, Uganda through school partnerships and curriculum development, particularly in relation to sustainable development, children's rights and global citizenship. The charity has no overheads. Every penny donated to the Henleaze Junior School Uganda Fund is donated to Bristol Masindi Partnership to pay for our exchange visits and to fund development projects at our partners school.
Our exchange visits enable teachers to learn from each other in two very different countries, in two very different environments. It is important to note that this is not a one-way process. We learn as much from our colleagues in Uganda as they learn from us.
During our visits, we have identified projects at the school which we can support to improve their environemnt and their curriculum. It is important to us that these projects are agreed with the staff in Uganda on the basis of their priorities and the impact on children's health and education.
The partnership with Kasongoire Primary School provides us with a meaningful context to teach about global issues such as race and culture, and importantly, the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. We have a personal connection with a school that is seriously affected by almost all 17 of these goals. Our curriculum focuses on access to education, access to clean energy, acces to clean water and sanitation, gender equality and zero hunger.
That is the minimum cost of a single teacher exchange: one teacher each way for a week.
We have found that sending or bringing over two teachers provides more than doubles the benefit. A week working in schools as different as Henleaze and Kasongoire is exhausting, but hugely rewarding. Teachers working in pairs or groups can make an impact on more children during that week, and can collaborate to introduce change in their own schools as a result of what they learn.
Costs have risen steeply since the pandemic. The price of flights has rocketed (excuse the pun). In addition, the British Council Connecting Classrooms grant which used to fund our exchange visits has been withdrawn. Therefore, the only way to continue our partnership is to run an annual fundraising campaign in school, and to ask our staff to pay 50% of the cost of their visit.