Minutes:
TRUSTS FOR AFRICAN
SCHOOLS
MINUTES OF MEETING OF
TRUSTEES ON 9 DECEMBER 2015
Present: Norma
Empringham, Ben Howland, Guy Cowley,
Steve James, Gill
Marshall-Andrews, Luke Morris, Johnnie
Morris, Ben Taylor
Apologies: Lissa
Campbell, Will Jones, Tom Marshall-Andrews,
1.Minutes of
meeting on 21 September 2015 were agreed.
2. Schools update
Stephen Kameti’s report was discussed and all agreed it
was an excellent document. It covered the achievements made by the 5 ‘old’
schools which will now not receive further TAS funding unless there are ring
fenced donations. SK will however continue to visit and the school trusts will
continue to raise local funding and offer support to the school partnerships
that have been set up.
GMA described her visit to the ‘new’ schools which was
very encouraging. The schools are all
extremely needy and the local trustees appeared to be able and highly committed
to school improvement. This was particularly true of Jarajara Primary School
which is on the north side of the Tana River and entirely Somali. The
headteacher there seemed to be well organised and proud of the fact that his
school was ‘A Child Friendly School’.
This is a UNESCO programme which aims to introduce more child centred
learning as well as child protection. GMA and SK will explore the rolling out
of this programme to other TAS supported schools.
The new treasurers are of high calibre and the four new
bank accounts were opened by them without difficulty. The treasurer and GMA are the sole
signatories on the accounts.
Each new school has presented a proposal for funding
which Lissa has put onto the website and which is considered later in the
meeting.
The Loldia Trust is being excellently run by Joan Dickie
whose approach to funding proposals is exemplary. The Eburru Primary school
classrooms are finally under way and should be completed in 3 months if all
goes to plan.
3. Website
Tom aims to simplify the financial element of the site in
the new year and to make some of the content more accessible. It was agreed that the content itself is
good.
4. Finance
The donations this year have been down a little because
the demand for funding has reduced. This
is because funding for the ‘old’ schools has been phased out and the ‘new’
schools have only just come on stream.
Next year however there is likely to be a high demand for funds so
additional sources will be sought.
There was a discussion about the possible risk attached
to funding of the new schools. It was
agreed that the risk was unlikely to be significantly different from that
associated with the ‘old’ schools. The
TAS model of funding is designed to reduce the risk of funds going astray and
the process is continually under review.
5. Inservice
training
The TESSA (Teacher Education in Sub Saharan Africa)
project is being pursued by Joan Dickie.
A full report will be available at the next meeting.
6. Proposals for
funding
The list of projects for funding was discussed and
agreed. In particular, the difference in
the cost of a kitchen for Mitamysi and for Jarajara was noted. Trustees accepted that the additional cost of
transport and materials in Jarajara explained the difference.
7. Marathon 2016
Joan Dickie will run for TAS and has been enrolled. She will be encouraged to open a Virgin Money
Giving account so we can maximise her fund raising.
8. TAS Tenth anniversary celebration.
This was discussed and agreed in principle. BT will explore availability in May of Ernst
and Young 9th floor space and cost for 100 people. GMA will explore a speaker.
9. Next meeting
Many thanks to Ben H for the meeting room and refreshments at
Kingley Street.
The next meeting
will be on Tuesday 19 April at 6pm at Luke’s
office 16 Great Queen Street WC2N
5BD.
POST MEETING NOTE:
- The situation with Kimphe Langano
Primary School was not discussed.
Will visited the school in
August 2015 and now has doubts about the viability
of ongoing support as there is not a strong local team for TAS to work
with. He would like to suggest we
wean the school off TAS support which will hopefully install the
discipline they need to structure their internal arrangements. He
will separately develop income generating ideas (mill/ irrigation)
alongside to see if this is something that might be viable. This will
be on the agenda of the next meeting.
- A cheque for £151 from Norbury Manor
Business and Entreprise College was received on 10 December for Usueni and
will be forwarded on to them.
