A Year Later: "The Whole Community is Benefiting"

Before we rehabilitated the well at Susu Gospel Primary School, students had to leave school grounds to get water or use the restroom.

"It was very challenging to get water," said Magdalene N'danema, a teacher and the chairperson of the school's water user committee. "There was no pure drinking water, and the children were always sick from diarrhea and stomachaches. [They would] always come to school late. The distance from [the] village to the stream is very far."

But now that the school has a working well just a few steps from the students' classrooms, there's no need for students to roam the community, and their health has drastically improved.

Magdalene continued: "The water facility is functional in the school compound, and there is no more diarrhea, cholera, and other related waterborne diseases because we now have clean and safe drinking water in the school compound, and the whole community is benefiting from this water facility."

Now that their everyday lives are more stable, both the students and the staff can look to the future with hope.

"One of our goals over the years is to see that our pupils come to school very early and are focused during class hours with no distractions of them taking excuses of going home to drink when classes are going on," Magdalene said. "This place is very remote, and even our sanitation facility was closed on the children because there was not enough water to take care of [the latrines], so the children had to go in the bush or in their homes. I am very happy that we have been able to achieve that through the rehabilitation of this water facility."