Mitchelstown children sample life in rural Uganda

Five transition year students from Presentation Secondary School, Mitchelstown recently travelled to the Ugandan village of Mbula to see first hand what life is like for young people in that country.
 “This really was the trip of a lifetime for the girls and, indeed, for us” said teacher Juliet Claffey. “The girls saw huge differences between their school and those of the Ugandan children.
“They interacted well with the Ugandan children and learned a lot about life in rural Uganda. In contrast to the Irish girls’ i-pods and camera phones, the Ugandan children have very little and I know that this left my students very appreciative of what they have”.
“The infrastructure and the facilities that we take more or less for granted in our school just don’t exist in Mbula” says Juliet.
“The classrooms there are overcrowded but there are hundreds more children whose parents either cannot afford the few pennies that is charged for attendance or else they can see no value in education, especially for girls, so they are put to work in the fields instead”. It is hoped that five or six students and a couple of teachers from Mbula will visit Mitchelstown later in the year.