2019 is done, long live 2020!

Hello everyone and welcome to 2020.  Something weird about saying that.  I almost feel like I am back in the 1980s and that is a commercial for a home computer from Tandy at Radio Shack.  Regardless of my old person issues, we are here in 2020.  I wanted to take a moment and reflect on 2019 at the school then get into what we working towards in 2020.

For a short version of our 2019 year in review you can check out the following video:

For those that want a more detail look back at 2019 keep reading:

Let's start with some of the things we are still doing that we have mentioned in previous year updates:

• We continue to have morning devotions using Best Loved Bible Stories books purchased in Arusha.  The big change is that students from Standard I and II now read the stories to the pre-school students every morning.

• Every Friday we have a Bible Class.  

• Thursdays we have student presentations (they refer to it as debate) where we also do competitions and educational games between classes.

• Every Wednesday afternoon we have "Reading with Barnabas" using virtual mission trip videos of our supporters in the USA reading stories or sharing knowledge with our students.
• We continue to report to the Tanzanian government using their grading scale (21-40 is a D, 41-60 is a C, 61-80 is a B and 81-100 is an A), but we also continue to use a more western scale to encourage our students to do better (60-69 is a D, 70-79 is C, 80-89 is a B and 90-100 is an A).
• We held Spelling and Mathematics competitions for each grade this year and we hope to compete against other schools next year.

• We continue to teach in English (except for their Kiswahili class) because they will need English skills in their Secondary education where government schools only teach in English.
• Our Choir continued to practice this year and performed for the mission team, local church and in our end of year performances that I recorded.

• We gave out Christmas gifts to the students and staff again this year.

Some new things in 2019 including some not on the short video:

Three new pieces of playground equipment.  We got a new swing set, bird's nest swing and a see-saw for the school this year.

We had a team from Mauldin UMC visit and do a Vacation Bible School week with our kids including having the Maasai come in and teach them about their culture and a Friday presentation to the parents that has not been done before.

We had a small group from Devoted Ministries also visit the school as well as visit with the local church and Compassion Program:

We also added Solar Power systems to all the classrooms on site.

This allowed the school to add two computers donated by the USA and 2 televisions bought in Tanzania to our school resources.  We have used them for the "Reading with Barnabas" program, the Virtual Mission Trip Program, the Teach the Teacher program, competitions and utilizing multimedia educational programs and slideshows to break up the classroom environment from the normal blackboard instruction.

We went from me showing the videos on my laptop

to using the televisions

for larger group presentations

without the students losing interest

We also replaced and upgraded our school septic system.

We even upgraded our latrine area with new sinks and large wash areas for when pre-school students have accidents.

We even added a new school (new to us) bus this year.

We increased our textbooks to 1 per subject per student in the Standard Grade Classes

We also added nearly 300 new books this year with many more donated and ready to take over.  This included a complete set of Encyclopedias and teacher reference books.  We also added educational poster, games, puzzles and other teaching aides to our school resources.

More books to take over.

New resources like the play and napping mats have helped our preschool tremendously.

We finished the school year with 5 classes:  Standard II, Standard I, Pre-Unity Pre-school, Middle Pre-School and Baby Pre-School. We had 6 teachers not including our head teacher to finish the school up with and 100 students.  

So what do we think we have in store for 2020.  At least 130 students if not more.  We plan to add the Standard III class.  More teaching resources.  More virtual mission trips and at least one more physical mission trip.  I will be returning to the site for another year though I do plan to take a longer break for the summer to handle my passport renewal and to be home while more small groups meet.  

If you would like me to speak to your group in May 2020, please contact as soon as possible because I plan to fill that month up with as many talks as possible.