Francis is a senior teacher at Bungwe primary school. He takes his job seriously, and takes pride in the progress the school and his students have made.
He teaches Tayla, who featured in our Harvest appeal this year. Thanks to your support at Fast days and throughout the year they now have safe, reliable water at their school - and a vegetable garden to grow nutritious meals for the children too.
Francis, teacher at Bungwe Primary School, Zimbabwe
I’m Francis. I'm a senior teacher at this school and have been here for about 11 years.
I grew up not thinking about being a teacher. But you know, as you grow up, we start to see how life takes you, and things begin to shape themselves.
I came here in 2014. During that time, it was difficult for us to work in this environment. I grew up in an urban area, so it was my first time to be in the rural area. We travelled a distance to fetch water, so it was hard. Life wasn't that easy for me to adapt to it, but as time goes on, you get used to that.
When I came here, the students’ life wasn't that good. The environment wasn't conducive. They were going to the toilets and coming back to class without washing hands. We used to record a number of diseases, especially diarrhoea and learners suffering from diarrhoea leads to them missing a lot of school.
As a teacher, we act in local families, you'll be like a parent. It will hurt you to see your one of your kids suffering from a certain disease, and that kid will be not coming attending lessons that will affect you.
Your donation today to our Harvest appeal can help teachers like Francis keep children safe and learning at school.
Tayla – she's one of our kids. She's good in school. She’s social. She wants to help others. We’ve even given her responsibilities when teachers are not around, she's also a prefect senior. She's a responsible child.
I think the school, if everything goes well with the plans, I think the school can produce good learners and also people who can do well.
Tayla and Chief in the gardens of Bungwe Primary school where Francis is a teacher
We can now grow vegetables in the garden. Some of the vegetables we sell, some of them will be used at the kitchen. The money that we get from the projects, some of it will go back again to the project for it to sustain. And then some of the money is being used to develop the school.
These projects are part of the curriculum. We have subjects like agriculture, where we have grown vegetables and during these lessons we teach the children how to take care of plants.
With the solar-powered water pump, the children can have safe water at school to drink and wash their hands. Meaning less children miss school due to getting sick or because they have to collect water. The school can also water their very own vegetable garden so the children can have nutritious school meals.
By giving to our Harvest appeal, you can help children like Tayla to stay in school studying with Francis, so that they can achieve their dreams.
