Madagascar: Completing the Nursery

As 2017 drew to a close, we joined forces with the Espérance Marianina association in Madagascar. We were united in completing the construction of the new nursery wing at the Marianina school. The original construction plans had been delayed due to hurricanes, pest infestations and outbreaks of illnesses which plagued the whole country and severely impacted the villager’s efforts. The completion date was pushed into 2018 as we teamed up to complete the project.

         

The first day of term was then delayed due to the reorganisation of The Ministry of Education. However, the new term started on the 19th of November which saw 65 fresh-faced nursery school children taking their seats in the new building. Furniture is being prepared and adapted especially for the children with new pieces being added as soon as they are constructed.

We are so proud that this project finally came to fruition and that more than sixty children are now learning and playing in such lovely new conditions.

Event: The Financière Arbevel Golf Tournament

For the 4th year running we are once again delighted that the Financière Arbevel is the key sponsor for this golfing tournament.

We are very grateful to the Financière Arbevel for welcoming us and actively participating to raise funds for our future projects. We were also blessed by the presence of the key associations: RFF and ASET 93.

It was an excellent day to raise funds for these beautiful causes. Unbelievably the sum collected was multiplied by 4 thanks to the generosity of Jean Baptiste Delabare, which means that more than €6,000 has been collected for each association.

Special thanks once again particularly to Jean-Baptiste and the Financière Arbevel’s team for the organization, welcome, generosity and hospitality.

For SBA, these proceeds will allow us to fortify our projects, particularly in the areas of student health and exercise with rugby.

Cameroon: 2017-2018 academic results

This year there was a delay in the publication of the official exam results. But here they are, and it is with proud pleasure that we present them to you: for the General and Technical Baccalaureate we achieved a 57% success rate that contrasts so well with the 51% national average figure which itself, continues the upward trend from previous years.  See link: https://www.journalducameroun.com/261756-2/

“Probatoire” is the equivalent of the first year (yr 12) Baccalaureate and here we saw an 84.6% pass rate.

CAP : 100% Pass BEPC : 66.6% Pass 100% of year 6 will now progress to year 7.

So, for the intermediary class, 85.8% of the children passed through to the next level.

We are very proud of the results our team have attained thanks to some awesome teaching support. As   a whole, the figure of 82.7% represents a high amount of children progressing to the next class which is even better than the previous year’s attainment of 73%. Good job team! Congratulations to all! Here’s to continuing along this successful path throughout the 2018 to 2019 new school year.

(Translation by Raphael Nash)

Cameroon : L’Eau Claire Infirmary Fully Operational

Last November, we noticed a decrease in the number of patients attending our old health centre. We took action and agreed a partnership contract with the University des Montagnes in order to increase the amount of medical staff we could make available. Previously we operated for just two days with a doctor and a midwife, alas this was just not sufficient to meet our needs. Since March, we have a nurse five days a week in our Bangangté centre. This nurse makes it possible not only for children at the centre and their families to benefit from first aid, but now encompasses other inhabitants of the village. In addition to direct first aid, visitors can receive advice on how to prevent disease; learn how to make early detection of illnesses and know how to ensure rapid transportation to the hospital if necessary. So we are very pleased to have finally put in place our partnership with University des Montagnes (UdM).

In three months, the number of visitors to the infirmary has steadily increased: mainly thanks to word of mouth instigated by Djibril and visitors from Jacques in the city of Bangangté. We ran three awareness campaigns to help drive people to attend and receive their tetanus booster jabs. It is good news indeed that this summer we will host a general practice consultation facility available for all the children at the centre.

This is Jacques our nurse administering a vaccine to Camille, one of our Bangangté rugby players. As planned, the month of June was an opportunity to build education about the need for tetanus jabs for the Bangangté players. There is no way you can forget who manages our Eau Claire center: Djibril, with his yellow T-shirt as he also benefits from the booster vaccine. All that with a smile!

First time back in 10 years!

 

We would like to thank his Majesty Bernard Mbiandou Yongang of the traditional Lafeng Chefferie, who greatly helped us to promote the infirmary.

Translation by Raphael Nash