Zimbabwe Group
Humble Beginnings
A 2003 school librarians’ conference in South Africa…. A chance meeting with a librarian from the Edward Ndlovu Memorial Library in Gwanda, Zimbabwe…. When she heard of the need first hand, Upper School Librarian Pat Ebhohimen decided she had to help. Her goal was simple: collect as many pens and pencils as possible and send them to her contact in Zimbabwe so that students could learn to write on paper instead of in the dirt.
Students Join In
By 2006, students began volunteering to help raise funds to pay for the postage to send these precious items. A holiday candle sale was held, the packages were sent, and the ISL Zimbabwe Group was born. Today the group counts 16 Upper School student members and meets every Wednesday at lunchtime to discuss the situation in Zimbabwe and plan both its response and fund raising activities.
Activities and Achievements
Since 2007, the group has set an annual target for the number of pens and pencils it hopes to collect. The 10,000 target set for 2008 was impressively surpassed with more than 12,000 collected. This year the focus has been school notebooks. Zimbabwe Group students carefully considered and discussed whether to post them from Europe or whether to allocate funds for local purchase. The latter was decided upon and €1000 was sent to Zimbabwe for their purchase. Students take part not only in fundraising, but have a voice in all group decisions. Sometimes local experts are invited to the meetings. Following a visit to the group by the NGO CARE in Luxembourg, the group also decided to donate €1000 to help combat cholera in Zimbabwe. However, the group focuses primarily on responding to the needs of school children in rural Matebeland where the Edward Ndlovu Memorial Library is based.
Read an article published in the local press about the Zimbabwe Group.
