This project has been completed under the direction of Peace Corps Volunteer Ciera Smith.
To read about the beginning of the project, CLICK HERE.
The project was to provide access to safe and clean water for the school and to provide water for the community women’s garden.
Ciera reports:
The scope of the project was to bring access to clean and safe drinking water to Kerewan Dumbokono Lower Basic School. At the beginning, our goal was to repair the handle on the school hand pump well and also clean the open well on school grounds.
The community organized themselves to contact a man from a nearby village who specializes in wells. After his estimate, we realized the school pump well needed more work than just repairing the handle on the pump. The cylinders inside the well had caved in so now the sand had to be dug out and the cylinders replaced. So our scope shifted from working on both the pump well and the open well to just working on the pump well.
Four men were hired for the entire work on the pump well. First, they dug out all of the sand that was around the steel pipe inside of the well. Then, they created and filled molds for the well cylinders. My counterpart (Muhammed Kongira) and I bought and transported all the materials needed to make two cylinders from the nearest town, Bansang. The materials included 2 bags of cement, gravel, and 8 steel rods.
Once the cylinders were made, the men placed them inside the well. After, another local man was hired to re-install the steel pipe that goes inside the well and repair the hande. Funds were spent on materials and transportation, labor for digging out the sand and replacing the cylinders, and re-installing the pump itself.
The students, teachers and community members were very happy and appreciative of having access to water at the school again. Students expressed that they were relieved to not have to walk to the other side of the village to get water during school hours. The teachers also expressed that they will be happy to not have students leave their classrooms for extended periods for water breaks.
We are grateful to Ciera for completing this important project, and again extend our thanks to Michael and Carla Boyle for providing the funding.
