The Need for Clean and Abundant Water
Thirsty? Walk 20 feet to the fridge and get a glass of clean, cold, filtered water from the dispenser. Ready for bed? Wash your face and brush your teeth with warm and cool water from the faucet in your bathroom. We forget what a blessing clean, running water is, available wherever and whenever we want. In rural Uganda, running water is not the norm.
Little children learn early to help the household by carrying water back home from a local well, if they are lucky enough to have access to clean water. A full Jerry can (like below) can weigh up to 40 lbs.
When the first well was completed on the John Paul Secondary School campus in 2015 – it was a huge boon for not only the students and teachers but also the local community. Prior to that, the closest water access was often over an hour round trip, so students might spend multiple hours a day walking to and from, carrying heavy Jerry cans of water.
With the well available on campus, it cut travel time dramatically so students could devote more time to classes, studies, sports, and friends. And the local folks in Chelekura were invited to use it as well.
However, as our campus continued to grow from the 218 students in 2015 to close to 700 today, you can imagine the bottleneck that having only one water access point causes. The well is currently operated with a hand-pump, so filing each container takes time.
FOJPS is working with our local contractor, Mutyaba Construction, and the Uganda Water Project to create a water supply system that will provide for the campus now and into the future. The process involves testing the current well to determine the water output and compare to the needs of the growing campus. Then, designing a piping system that will bring water to multiple access points, including the new kitchen, both girls and boys dorms, and sanitation stations at the multiple latrines throughout campus, as well as specific access provided for the local farmers and townsfolk in Chelekura.
Imagine what an improvement this will make for our students, teachers, administrators and everyone in the Chelekura community. Thank YOU so much for your help in working to make this a reality for these deserving people.
Water Use on Campus
Our students all come to campus with their own Jerry can and bucket so they can get their own water for drinking and washing. Hand washing stations like you see below are set up around campus so the students can wash before meals, after using the latrine and before entering classes. They do their own laundry in buckets and hang it out to dry.
