The Cooks in Zambia: World Child Care

Today we went to a poor compound in Lusaka called Mutendere East. We went with some friends, Mr. Phiri and Mr. Felix, to visit a school called World Child Care. This school was started by the singing group, Amazing Voices, which I have posted videos before. The group decided to give back to the community by starting a school for orphaned and vulnerable children in Lusaka. Mr. Phiri is the leader of Amazing Voices, and I have been trying to help him with promoting this school via internet. They had produced a documentary about their school on DVD and I have been trying to upload it to YouTube, but I am having some difficulties. (If anyone can help me with this upload, please email me at cook@bmoz.org)

So, we arrived at the school during the morning session. The school is currently located in a rented house with 2 rooms. One room is about 8 ft. by 15 ft. and the other about 10' by 10'. They use both rooms during the day as classrooms for the children. There is only grass mats on the dirt floor and a few benches for sitting. The volunteer teachers have the morning session from 8-12 and then another session from 12-4. Previously, at the church they were using, they had sometimes 300 students, but now that they have such a smaller space, they have to turn children away. Today there were about 60-65 children in this house for the morning session. The childrens ages range from 4 years old to 11 years old, and most of them are double orphaned, which means they lost both parents (maybe to AIDS or something else). Some of them have at least one parent, and others have parents, but cannot afford to go to school. The government schools in Lusaka are too expensive for a lot of children to attend. World Child Care has just been registered with the government, but because they are not funded by the government, they do not receive much, if any, school materials.

Upon arrival, the kids loudly sang to us... "Hello, Welcome to our school!" We got to talk with the children asking questions about their life and school. Ricky spoke with one group while Niki spoke to the other. And then Coby read a Bible story for the children. We sang a few more songs, and then while we talked with the teacher and Mr. Phiri, Coby & Kelsey began playing soccer with the kids. Before we left, we presented the school with a gift from Denmark FBC. Their VBS 2007 offering will be used to help provide books, materials, supplies, and even food for the students at World Child Care. They were very appreciative of the gift, and we intend to go back and volunteer in the school, maybe helping the teachers with lessons, and just being an encouragement for these children.