Zambian teachers "immersion" into Killina school life!
Geraldine Grennan
With various fundraising activities currently taking place to fund the 2019 trip to Zambia by students from Killina Presentation Secondary School as part of their Immersion Programme, teachers and students in the county Offaly school were delighed to host two teachers from the African school earlier this year.
Michael Kalondo, Principal of Killina's partner school, Mahilo, in Zambia, and teacher, Ms. Majory Nyambe, were given a wonderful “Céad Mile Fáilte” in Killina, and a host of events took place in the school to mark the brief visit.
Mahilo Primary School is located in Kaoma, in the Western Province of Zambia, and Killina have
been global partners with the school since the first Immersion trip taken by teachers and students in 2015.
Following the wonderful welcome that killina has received during two previous trips to Zambia, this trip by Mr. Kalondo and Ms. Nyambe was a great opportunity for the school community to be able to return the compliment with a teacher visit.
During their time in Killina, Mr. Kalondo spoke at senior and junior assemblies about Mahilo school, its staff, students and facilities. Mahilo has approximately 1400 students, and is a mixed school catering for boys and girls. It caters for children from preschool to the equivalent of our Junior Cert. Killina students learned of the difficulties faced by students in Mahilo with under resourcing of the school there, and were very surprised to learn that the facilities in Mahilo Primary School are so poor that the teachers have to run the school in shifts so that they can accommodate all the pupils.
During his address to students, Mr. Kalondo expressed great thanks for the resources that the Killina Presentation community has provided Mahilo, both in person during visits and also through donations. During their visit to Killina, the two representatives from Mahilo school took part in a number of lessons, from Irish folklore with Ms. Kennedy’s TY class to PE with Mr. Austin' first years. They were also entertained by the wealth of musical talent in Killina, enjoying a display of Irish music, song and dance from the students and Ms. Kavanagh’s choir, with a concert on the last day of their visit to Killina.
During their time in Ireland, the two Zambian visitors also visited various tourist attractions around the country, including the Burren in Co Clare to Kilmainham Gaol and they also got to witness a great display of Gaelic football, when they watched Shamrocks beat Ballycumber in Tubber!
Both Michael & Majory had a great experience of Irish culture and education, and were humbled by the warmth and generosity of the Irish people!
One of the main aims of the Killina Mahilo global partnership is that both sides can learn from each other and this trip certainly helped to achieve that, as well as further strengthening the partnership between the two schools.
As part of the global partnership project, Killina school has established a Development Education committee which is student-led with teachers providing backup and assistance as necessary. The commitee is responsible for raising awareness of development education issues throughout the school. Killina has also managed to integrate DE into different curricular areas. For example, links between Leaving Cert Chemistry and Geography have been established regarding climate change and population densities
Killina School would like to thank the community of Rahan and Mucklagh for their continued generosity and support of Killina’s Immersion Programme and Global Partnership, and they would also like to thank Worldwise Global Schools for their continued support in the integration of development education into the whole school community.