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A total of $5,000 has been raised for this project by MSV and our partner Rotary Club of Frankenberg, Germany.

The challenge began when news reached our member Lyn Gedny of the hardships that the children were facing in the village of Ile, in Mozambique.

Lyn's daughter Ellie and her husband Paul had arrived in Ile as volunteers to teach the children as part of the U.S. Peace Corp project. They found that the children's enthusiasm to learn was the only 'plus' point to the school, and set out to improve this situation.

Through Lyn's organised fund raising, the two Rotary Clubs were able to provide desk and chair units for the children, which were made at the local Technical School in Mozambique.

'The School Library' consisted of a room with no shelves OR books! Through our collective funding, another local industrial unit was commissioned to build desks, seats and shelves. The Rotary International Logo was painted freehand on the wall of the new Library. Now all that was needed were books………..

Lyn's wife Renee, arranged for boxes of old teaching books from schools in Barcelona to be sent to Ile, which included an overland trip from Maputo. So truly this became not only a Rotary project but a family project as well!

The outcome of 'The School Library Project' has been that the room is not big enough for the number of children who now want to use it! So in true Rotary fashion - a new room is being built!

On Lyn and Renee's last visit, they saw that even more changes had been made! Bags of cement have been used to produce a new 'playing field', complete with basketball hoop and volleyball court; the children themselves have repainted walls; a chess set has been purchased and is in full use; an 'English Club' has been introduced, where the children act out plays and what was once the old toilet block, has now been transformed into a new Counselling Centre.

And all of this is still out of those same original funds and still undertaken by local craftsmen,

thereby keeping the whole community involved.

In true Rotary fashion, this is really promoting peace and goodwill through a World Fellowship.