Ripple Africa understands how important primary education is to Malawi’s development and is therefore providing support to six local primary schools. Most of our efforts are focused on reducing class size – work is to reduce class size – there can be over 100 pupils in each class – and providing better learning environments for students. Subsequently, we have built several classroom blocks and pay the salaries of four trainee teachers.  Our ultimate goal is to help children succeed in school and with their exams so they are able to continue their education at the secondary school level.

Ripple Africa supports primary education in Malawi by helping six primary schools in the villages of Mwaya, Matete, Mazembe, Kachere, Kazando and Chiomba.

The serious issues we are tackling include:

• Underfunding of primary schools by the government, resulting in a lack of resources including teachers, books, desks, and classroom blocks.
• Lack of teachers and suitable buildings which leads to very large class sizes. Although student/teacher ratios have improved slightly over the years due to the government hiring more teachers, there is still much more that needs to be done. Between the six primary schools which Ripple Africa helps, there are 47 government teachers for 3805 students. This equates to a student teacher ratio of 81:1 and improving to 73:1 with the trainee teachers we employ! However, at our largest school – Kachere Primary School, there are 11 government teachers for over 1,000 students, which makes a student to teacher ratio of 91:1.
• Students who don’t learn in permanent classroom blocks either study in temporary structures or are taught outside, which can make teaching in the rainy season impossible.
• A majority of Malawians will never receive any education beyond primary school, This makes it absolutely crucial that a quality primary school education is provided, complete with all the skills needed to survive and prosper into adulthood.

Ripple Africa is responding to the challenges facing primary education in Africa by:

• Providing vital resources, such as desks, to improve the general learning conditions for these children
• Paying for trainee teachers — Ripple Africa supplements government teachers by providing additional trainee teachers to reduce classroom sizes
• Actively encouraging its trainee teachers to apply for proper government teacher training so that more trained teachers can be employed at the primary schools. In doing so, the government will pay their salaries, and Ripple Africa can then employ other trainee teachers
• Improving the facilities at primary schools, including the building of new classroom blocks.

Ripple Africa is paying for four additional Malawian trainee teachers. In addition, our overseas teaching volunteers provide valuable support in the classroom as volunteer teaching assistants, and through the sharing of their knowledge and training with the existing teaching staff.

Ripple Africa has built two double classroom blocks at Mwaya Primary School providing four additional classrooms, as well as a teachers’ office and new toilets. Double classroom blocks have also been constructed at Chiomba, Matete and Mazembe Primary Schools along with classroom maintenance and teacher offices at Matete and Mazembe Primary.

Through Ripple Africa’s partnership with our American not-for-profit partners Ripple Africa, Inc., the charity has also helped build two double classroom blocks at Mazembe Primary School, and has renovated and painted existing classrooms at three schools.

Recently, menstrual toilets have been constructed at all our primary schools to enable girls to stay in school when menstruating and we have rebuilt the toilet facilities at Mazembe Primary which were no longer safe to use.

In order to help older students study for their exams in the evenings, Ripple Africa has installed solar lights for Standard 8 classrooms at four primary schools.

Ripple Africa has developed an excellent relationship with the District Education Officer and the headteachers of all the local primary schools. Together, we work in partnership to respond to local needs and provide feasible solutions to the problems that are identified.

• Providing educational resources and trainee teachers as long as funding allows.
• Construction of additional classroom blocks for our six primary schools, as well as ongoing repairs and maintenance to existing classrooms as needed.
• Building of teachers’ houses at the six primary schools to attract additional quality teachers to our schools – especially important in a poor rural area such as ours.