January 2022 The Nkuru College is ready to receive students - the campus is looking beautiful and a huge range of Business and Vocational courses are available.

As never before after almost 2 years of school closures nationally, there is a whole generation of young people that need skills to live and earn.

Click here to visit Nkuru College webpage for more details on the College.

A New Partnership Project

An overview of the partnership project can be seen on the CRM webpage https://crm-manchester.org/our-work-in-uganda/

The Partnership specifically brings Julius Muyombya as full-time Project Manager over the next 12 months and starting immediately in a volunteer capacity.

 Julius, brought up as an orphan in Kisenyi Shanty Town, was brought to St David’s College via Link International.  Supported by a group of St David’s College parents and friends, Julius succeeded beyond all expectations and in 2019 graduated from Bangor University with a 1st Class Degree in Business and Law.  He then secured a post as Business Advisory Consultant with a global finance company in Kampala, he is now ready for directly bringing to bear his passions which are aligned with the work of LII and CRM.

Julius on the roof of the CRM project building in Kulambiro, Kampala

Current Progress:

·      66% Retail Development in Kulambiro completed

·      60% of the 10 acres of land in Kapeka paid for

·      3 years’ salary and accommodation secured for Julius

Above: the commercial building development in Kulambiro

Below: The geographical relationship between the two project sites - Kapeka and Kulambiro

Further Funding for Development Plans:

Phase 1:  

·      Complete Retail Development (£50,000)

·      Complete Land payment & build accommodation for the 1st local workers (£30,000)

·      Purchase microbus to provide an on-going income stream for staff salaries (£13,000)

Phase 2:

·      Purchase a further 10 acres of land adjacent to the land in Kapeka (£30,000)

·      Purchase a 2nd microbus to provide salaries for additional employees (£13,000)

·      Planning preparations, proposals and documents for Phase 3 (£5,000)

Phase 3:

·      Major build development on 20 acres of land over 2 years (£1,5000,000)

Above: The land in Kapeka for the project development

Below: The concept drawings for the project development

Giving opportunities to support the Project Partnership:

Funding can be donated and gift aided either via: 

·      Link International Innovation contact Tim at  revtimhall@stdavidscollege.co.uk

·      Christian Restoration Manchester contact Isaac at crm.manchester@gmail.com

 Both Charities are registered in UK and with HMRC 

Child Headed Household receive their food and clothes in time for Christmas

We are thrilled that Rose, Geoffrey, Richard and Betty were able to receive the food and basic provisions, including clothes, in time for Christmas thanks to the generosity of the pupils, parents and friends of St David’s College in response to the on-line ‘collection’ at the school’s virtual Carol Service.

St David’s College pupils have been supporting this child headed household over the last 7 years, providing housing, school fees, food and basic provisions. The Carol Service donations will provide food, school fees and basic provisions for the children for 2021.

The children are overseen in Uganda by the social work organisations CalmAfrica in conjunction with their school Jolly Mercy Learning Centre.

Since working with the children, the oldest boy Douglas, now in his 20’s, is able to support himself and live independently.

Chaplain of St David’s College, The Revd. Tim Hall, says, “It has been such a privilege to stand beside these children over the years as they have desperately tried to stay together and survive the rigours of life without parents. The Uganda Teams over the last few years have enabled our on-going support and this year it was so distressing to think we could not continue to support them. Parents, pupils and friends of St David’s stepped into the gap through their generosity at the Carol Service. We look forward to seeing how these children progress this year and hope and pray that new ways of supporting them will be found”.

In 2017, a combined team from St David’s College and Shebbear College worked on a new house for the children and Shebbear College ‘twinned a toilet’ with the one the team provided for the children. This long drop toilet now needs some repair work as well as a shelter building so the children can cook outside in the rains. The appeal donations link will remain open for donations during the coming year. £250 - £300 will achieve this final target.

Click here to make a DONATION

Click here to make a DONATION

3rd Space Llandudno Community Outreach in Covid-19

In partnership with 3rd Space Cafe/Bar in Llandudno, we applied for a grant from Community Foundation Wales, under their Coronavirus Resilience Fund.  This funding enabled 3rd Space to prepare and cook up to 500+ meals a day during the first Covid lockdown.  

The meals were distributed directly through local Llandudno food banks to the most needy and vulnerable in our local community, who had been directly affected by Coronavirus. We identified that there was a large amount of vulnerable families in the area and also those with children aged 0-3 years old who were in immediate need of food supplies.

We are so grateful to Gavin Mart of 3rd Space for pioneering this programme and as a Llandudno based charity we felt privileged to be given this opportunity to support our local community.

Opening Ceremony

The opening ceremony

On 19th November 2019 many people gathered from the local community and beyond to join in the opening celebrations .

Around 70% young people in Uganda do not have access to education beyond primary school. The College has been designed as a local community model to provide vocational skills which will enable young people to gain skills to lift them out of poverty by providing them with skills for work.

The College has had a huge impact in the development stages and has attracted considerable attention. It has an innovative model for matching teaching and learning using ‘Whole Brain Approach’ to identify appropriate courses and ‘Whole Person Approach’ to provide readiness for work and life.

Such has been the interest that the Archbishop elect of Uganda was pleased to officially ‘Open’ the College, joined by The Revd Tim Hall, Chaplain of St David’s College in North Wales.

It was such a privilege to be able to share this time with 3 past St David’s College pupils, John Njendahayo (Nkuru-Nziza Director), Zoe Calder (Head of Secondary at Acorn International School, Kampala) and Julius Muyombya (Business Advisory Associate, BDO, Uganda).

It is always a challenge to get family together but on this special occasion it was wonderful to be able to gather together John and Sophie’s family. The story is quite remarkable and stretches back into the 1950’s. In 1992, St David’s College was drawn into it connecting this tea plantation via the father of a past pupil to John’s father and mother. On that same tea plantation village today we are all able to join together to celebrate the success that comes through faithful service and a deep family commitment to their community.

The day was marked by speeches, performances, prayer, worship songs and cake.

During the day guests were able to take a tour of the College and see the amazing work going on across the Departments: Nursery School, Textile Design, Computer Aided Design, Computer Technology, Secretarial and Business Studies, Building and Construction including the sustainable technologies (ISB bricks, biodigesters, rainwater harvesting, water supply technology), Catering, Farming and Horticulture, Hair and Beauty etc.

The College campus is stunningly beautiful, with high quality living conditions for the students.

The impact of this development is so wide ranging – a water supply for the village that they have never had, a nursery school in safe and beautiful buildings, skills for life to provide an income and livelihood for so many young people, a radical new educational concept via matching teaching and learning and a ‘whole brain’ and ‘whole person’ approach’, the Church of Uganda brought together in a new way to influence their learning and ministry and development thinking, innovative technologies to steward the environment in sustainable and highly productive ways etc etc. The new developments seen here are the car and boda boda mechanics workshops, a new dormitory block and one of the metered water taps for the village.

The impact on the Church of Uganda continued this week on Thursday 5th December when the Archbishop elect brought his senior team to the Vocational Training College, for fellowship and discussions on the ‘Whole brain Approach’ to teaching and pastoral care and looking at the innovative ways the VTC provides education on sustainable stewardship of the environment and the range of skills taught at the College.  The church is acutely aware that 70% of all children in Uganda do not have access to Secondary Education and beyond.  This innovative local rural model of vocational skills training will have a profound impact on the overall development of Uganda in the future.