Laos School Projects
Our Club has been active in building and renovating schools in the Luang Prabang district in northern Laos since 2012. Our initial contact was through the late Rod Fraser and his “Your Own2Hands” Foundation. Rod set up our ongoing relationship with Somnuek Bounsa and his wife, Sisimone who operate a resort in Luang Prabang. Somnuek has proved to be a great communicator, project manager, builder and friend. As at mid-2020, our club, through Somnuek, has built five schools in scattered communities around the district.
The latest school, Ban Houay Tan was built during 2017 and 2018, in a fairly remote, mountainous and sparsely populated region. The villagers were very enthusiastic about the plan to replace the existing bamboo and timber school structure with a “standard government” structure of concrete, bricks and steel and to add a toilet block with wash basins. All the building materials had to be ferried across the Mekong – quite an exercise in the rainy season.
The opening ceremony took place on 5th December 2018 with enthusiastic attendance by locals, including very colourful and attractive dancers. Also in attendance was then District Governor Bronwyn Stephens, the Rotarian responsible for establishing World of Difference, which helped fund the school.
In addition to the funds provided for the project by World of Difference and by our own club, we received generous support from John Karagounis at CEO Circle and the Australian Government through its embassy in Vientiane.
Our next project, initially planned for 2020, is a library and incorporated computer room at Xieng Ngeun Secondary School, about 25km south of Luang Prabang. Xieng Ngeun is quite a large town of about 22,000 population. The school has only rudimentary library and computer facilities. It was visited in January 2020 and a secure location within the school grounds selected that will allow community access.
We are at present awaiting detailed planning and budgeting for the project, but due to Covid-19, the project may not happen in the 2021-22 Rotary year.
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Two other projects are currently in the planning stage, with progress held up by the pandemic.
- A South Sudan sanitation and hygiene project, which will provide 800 schoolgirls with long-lasting feminine hygiene kits and hygiene training.
- The PNG Anaesthesia Training Project, in which skilled teams from the Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists will visit PNG annually to provide intensive hands-on training to 50 doctors and other health professionals.