In September 2022, a willing team from SCB Group, the world-leading low carbon company, was delighted to join the NGO buildOn on a trip to assist in building a primary school in rural Malawi. Twenty SCB employees joined forces with local and international staff from the NGO, to build a school for a rural community lacking in adequate teaching facilities. Participants stayed in the homes of families in the local community for seven days.
“From the warm opening ceremony to the final goodbyes, it was clear the importance of education to the community for their children” – Ben Crick, Trek Participant.
In Mpeni, the village where the school is being built, children were previously taught under trees or in small huts and many had to walk up to 7 kilometres to a neighboring village to reach a school. As a result, many children didn’t attend school at all. Adults also marry and have kids at a very young age and thus drop out of school in their early teenage years.
“Living in Malawi, North, North-East, life is relentless, it’s a subsistence type of living. People are doing their day-to-day tasks to survive. Hopefully with this program we can assist them to thrive in their lives and their children’s lives can be improved,” said Edward Kennedy Trek Participant.
The new school will be completed by the end of 2022 with the installation of solar panels. It will not only give children and adults in Mpeni and its surrounding villages access to daily education but also a well-lit place to study for the evening adult literacy programs.
“This community is incredibly enterprising, working together on a level that I didn’t expect. When I’m back in my everyday life, I’ll try to remember how hard people work here. If you look at things a little differently, there always seems to be a solution,” said Jeff Hartmann, Trek Participant.
Kevin McGeeney, CEO of SCB is seen in this video interviewing Vitumbiko Mhango, Trek Leader in Malawi.
