Uganda, Africa
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Report Date: October 26, 2016
Key people: Timothy and Janepher Kakooza
New construction
It is always really interesting to see how much things change at Katosi School between visits. Timothy has received money from Pastors Chris and Julie Pruett and their church in the States and is erecting a large classroom block with 12 more classrooms. It is easy to see why these are needed as the school is continuing with an amazing amount of growth and there are probably another 200 children who would come in if the facilities permitted. There is also a replacement pit latrine being built. When I was there the hole was 5m deep and going deeper. But they certainly need it for so many people!
School
Timothy gives 674 as the approximate number of students. This is about the same as last year but it is always difficult to exactly tell as sometimes children come or go. There are 324 in boarding. This has increased from around 220 last year. Children up to Primary 3 (i.e. 10 years old) share a bed, often with a younger child. Classes continue to be stretched with two classes where the roll was 77, another with 58 and another 52. These classes generally do not have enough desks and sometimes there are 5 or 6 kids to a desk designed for 3, even for those children in Primary 5 (about 11-12 years old). These big classes were in the primary section. Secondary classes are smaller. There is still some drop out at Primary 7.
Timothy is looking at some more land at the bottom of the school property and has plans to put a vocational training centre there. I asked Timothy if the teachers ever had to wait for their salaries and he replied "by God’s grace, no" which is fantastic and extremely unusual here, even in government schools.
The budget does not include any replacement of equipment or improvements at that level. There is nothing for desks or other classroom items and limited allocation of funds for stationery resources for the teachers. The school is presently short of 112 beds and mattresses and a lot of desks.
Apart from the building activity and kids everywhere, the school is clearly in good heart, growing and meeting a need. School fees are still a challenge. Even though they are only 30,000 shillings (US$10) a term, many parents can’t pay.
Foundations for Farming (FfF)
There are encouraging signs in this community after Timothy and two guys attended Foundations for Farming training last year in Jinja. Both Emmanuel (Timothy’s assistant pastor) and Ephraim have seen good and encouraging results from the change in farming methods. In addition, Janepher has planted an acre of passionfruit which is a good cash crop and will yield some income for the school. I saw this and it looked great. She was practicing mulching and good water conservation strategies. Her calculation was that the income would be around 900,000 shillings (US$250) per week which would be allocated to the school and would help with the shortfall.
Marisara Babies Home
On the way out from Mukono to Katosi Timothy took me to Marisara Babies Home. It is clear that Timothy has some quite big plans for this site. He acquired this site in 2012 with the help of a legacy from the estate of a lady in Minnesota, USA. Subsequently some of her friends contributed to the costs of the houses to house the children. At present two of the houses are built and a third is under construction.
Timothy gets about two requests a month from people, or the police or government officials, to care for abandoned babies or young children. They employ six people on site and there are 15 children being cared for. It has been going now for three years. Interestingly the name is a combination of Timothy’s mothers name (Mariam) and Janepher’s (Sara).
The home is growing as space becomes available and buildings are built. On site there is also a nursery school which has 28 children, including the older ones in the home. These children come from outside and pay about 15,000 shillings ($5) a term. I found it difficult to gauge whether this was a particularly poor area as it is on the outskirts of Mukono City and about 2 km from the main road.
Ages of children range from around 6 months to 4 years although there were no birth records for most of them. When they get the children they first of all register them with the authorities. The women who care for the children (Hajarah and Bena were two of them) are themselves single mothers and live on site. All-in-all the place was peaceful and appeared to be well run and is on a lovely piece of ground.
If Timothy can find a donor he is likely to want to expand into a school on the site. This would be ideal for that. He is also about to put a demonstration Foundation for Farming plot in the middle of the land.
Timothy sees a need and responds to it, even when he doesn’t seem to have the actual resources to do it. He is always working ahead of the actual resources he has and this vision was birthed before he had funds for it. The plight of the children touched his heart and this ministry is certainly providing something which is essential here as he reports that the children would probably have died if they had not been taken into the home.
Like all of Timothy’s ministry, he has no difficulty getting one-time support for buildings but does not have the funding for the ongoing day to day costs and salaries.
Family
Timothy and Janepher's daughter Jireh was married last year and Mighty, the next one, is to be married in November. Mighty does a lot of the school administration. Joy is living with them and their son is studying at university in Kampala. They are unlikely to have empty nest syndrome any time soon though as there are 13 children and young people living in their household at present.
I wasn’t at the school for long enough to interview students this time.
Emmanuel
I did interview Emmanuel (unfortunately I forgot to take his photo!), Timothy’s assistant pastor. He was really grateful for the Foundations for Farming training last year and has been diligently putting it into practice. He has about 3 acres of land and is growing 2 acres of sweet potatoes as an income crop and also cassava and yams. He makes 1.2 million shillings (US$345) a crop from yams. He is also not burning the fields and is preserving the natural trees on his land, and is really pleased with the yield.
Janepher Kakooza
I thought I would profile what Janepher is doing on their land. Janepher and Timothy have some land about 5 km from Katosi town centre which they took me to. It appears that Janepher is taking a lot of responsibility for the crops on this land and goes to it most days. She seemed really pleased and proud of what they are achieving there. They grow cassava on parts and other crops which are used for the school. But the bit which blew me away was the passionfruit. They have set up about an acre of netting and have in the last year planted this in passionfruit. The first crop is about to be harvested. I understand that the crop will yield 3-4 bags a week over the harvest time of around three months. Each bag fetches about 300,000 shillings (US$85) which will help to supplement the school income. This is a really awesome development as it means that Timothy and Janepher are doing what they can to supplement income and not just looking for funds from donors. They are about to extend the planting to two acres.
In addition, Janepher told me that there would be a meeting on the Sunday after I left at the church of people who are interested in FfF principles and wanting to implement them. They are going to get organized to do this.
This school is clearly the most impressive institution in this community.
Katosi itself is experiencing some considerable improvements and the road from Mukono to Katosi is being significantly upgraded and widened.
There is an increasing demand of children who could attend the school at present.
The reality here is that resources will always not be enough. Timothy is a man with a really really big and expanding vision. They are definitely making a difference in this community but there is still much to be done.
Things we take for granted are difficult here. For instance, when girls have their monthly period they usually cannot afford pads and therefore do not go to school. This also contributes to early dropouts among the girls.
The continued positive influence of the school on the community. There are more children waiting to attend school. At present classroom space and the recruitment of good teachers hampers expansion.
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