Tue 14 July

Tues 14 July

I spent most of the day yesterday with Maggie Frame, a support for learning teacher from Greenwood Academy. When I came here 2 years ago Alison Scott, maths teacher at Greenwood but formerly St. Michael’s, came out for a couple of weeks to find a partner school. That school is Mzuzu Artisan Secondary School, which is a fairly new school with just about 100 students.

Maggie’s son and daughter-in-law have been out in Malawi for 1 year as volunteer workers and she and her husband are visiting them for 2 weeks. They are based in Blantyre, which is at the other end of the country but came to Mzuzu for 1day to try and improve the partnership links with Artisan. They are experiencing most of the problems we encountered when starting our partnership and I was glad to be able to advise on how best to move things forward.

The staff at Artisan were very receptive to new ideas and they are keen to come to St. Peter’s to learn about how a partnership can operate in Malawi. I think it is tribute to the St. Peter’s staff that they can now offer training to other Malawian schools on partnerships, just as we often do in Scotland.

Of course we had the usual Malawian welcome at Artisan with Singing, poems and drama and of course the obligatory speeches. I thought I would be spared this time but no such luck!

Meanwhile at St. Peter’s there are 36 applicants for the exchange visit next year. I thought it would have been higher but the teachers told me that a lot of students are too scared to travel as they have never been out of Mzuzu and others would be worried that their English isn’t good enough. Also we did not allow form 4’s to apply as they leave school in November this year. Although for the selection process I’m glad that the number isn’t higher – it’s a hard enough task! Tomorrow I will meet with the exchange committee to select up to 15 for interviews.

Paul and Anne are due back in Mzuzu tomorrow. I’m looking forward to hearing all about their Zambian adventures.

Pawemi,

Bernadette