Update on gated entrance project! Just $1400 needed.

[Martin Becktell]

Dear friends,

Thank you so much for your recent donations for the gated entrance project for St John Chrysostom School! May God bless you for helping to provide security for the students! At this time just $1400 is needed for the remaining building materials. Donate at EcoMercy.org. Here are the gates in Kamuli Town where they were welded:

I asked my father in Christ, Stephen, why he chose to go with solid gates. He said it is so that if people want to see inside they will have to ask for a tour---which we will be happy to provide! Such gates might not be appropriate for a school in the United States, but they are common in Uganda. And excellent security is expected for residential schools. We hope to eventually put a wall around the entire campus; though in some areas a fence combined with a hedge may suffice. In Revelation 21:12 the New Jerusalem is described as having a "great, high wall." Our gate is just 8 ft high! 🙂 

The wall will eliminate cows and goats as well as strangers being able to wander onto the school campus. A watchman will stand guard and monitor who enters during the day and then he will lock the gate at night and sleep in the guard shack next to it. Nevertheless, if the village well breaks down our well can still serve as a backup for villagers during the daytime.

Here are the gates before being painted:

 

And here is the alleyway behind the welder's shop where they were fabricated:

 

You can see the welder has been busy working on chairs also:

 

And here they are transferred to the school. I received this photo just today:



Please accept our heartfelt gratitude to all who have donated or shared about us on Facebook and elsewhere!

A quick summary of finances for the project:

Our June 15th Facebook fundraiser yielded $682 and our July 5th fundraiser brought in $405. Besides this I received various donations by check and PayPal and Facebook totaling about $1213, so that in total we have received about $2300 for the gated entrances. May God bless all who donated!  

So far I've been able to fund the following amounts
  - July 21: $866.
  - July 28: $985
Total funded: $1851.

The total cost of the gated entrance project for the gates at both primary and secondary (see the budget below) is estimated at 13,240,000 shillings which equals about $3700. Thus, we still need $1400.
 


Other needs totaling $545:

Currently there is only one solar powered lighting and cell phone charging system at St. John Chrysostom School, which is located in the offices of the secondary school. Joachim and Stelio would like to have one for their own room because the charging of phones has become very difficult, especially when it is cloudy. More power and charging ports would be a huge blessing.

Joachim and Stelio know someone in the low-voltage, solar business and have priced out a system:
1. Solar panel, 50 watts, 300,000 shillings
2. Battery, 450,0000
3. Five Bulbs, 100,000

4. Wires, 50,000
5. Labor, 120,000
6. Transport, 50,000
Total = 1,070,000 (About $314)

Also, there are gaps in the gardens that need to be planted. Joachim and Stelio would like to plant 75 kg of soybeans.

75 kilograms of soybean seeds at 10,000 shillings/kg ($2.90/kg, $1.34/lb) equals $231 currently.

Please donate!

Please give as you are able for these needs above. And consider setting up a recurring donation to fund our ongoing projects. Donate at EcoMercy.org.

100% of your donations are used for our programs and projects in Uganda.

A blessed day to you,

Martin Becktell
Director, EcoMercy International

P.S.

If you haven't had a chance to read it on Facebook, here is the text of the gated entrance fundraiser:

Imagine a sanctuary for academic learning for children, providing also hands-on gardening and animal rearing experience---a community center for learning how to grow food in new ways which build topsoil and increase species diversity. How could such a place change lives in Africa or in the United States or anywhere in the world?

At EcoMercy International, we are partnering with St. John Chrysostom School in Nakyaka village, Uganda, to help provide food security to our dear primary and secondary students by creating a beautiful "permaculture" farm! So far the dean of the school, my father in Christ, Stephen Lunagula, and his adult children have built two rainwater capturing tanks and installed a well--the school formerly had no water source of it's own. And they have planted vegetable gardens and several other organic crops including peanuts, sweet potatoes, bananas and pineapples. May God bless all those who have donated for building materials and seeds and various other supplies and needs!

But in addition to food security the campus needs, well, regular security!---mainly from roaming cows and goats, which can trample and feast on the gardens, but also from unknown persons who have no business being on the campus. Thus, a fence and gates are needed.

The fence is already mostly installed. During the recent 2020 lockdowns while students were gone, our dean and his children Jacob and Annah worked hard installing barbed wire. But as of yet there are no gated entrances to either the primary or secondary school. A small metal sign is currently all that distinguishes the entrance to the primary school.

God willing, through your help, We would like to install a double steel gate for vehicles and a smaller single hinge gate for foot traffic, mounted on reinforced concrete pillars and flanked on either side by a wall built from concrete-stabilized, compressed-earth bricks. (No trees need to be cut down to fire these special bricks!)

We had in mind a wall with a sign on it and a planting box in front of it, not unlike the entrance to my alma mater, the University of Idaho, although not so fancy. (See the photo below and see also a rough sample drawing which shows what we are thinking of.)

There would also be a small gate house for a security guard to stand watch. The total comes to 13,240,000 shillings. See the budget below. 1,080,000 shillings has already been funded which means that approximately $3700 is still needed to meet this need. The exchange rate is about 3400/1 currently.

Would you please help us to meet this need and thereby help to create a sanctuary for our village children, a safe place for learning where locals can also volunteer to learn new agricultural skills, growing food for boarding students, local students and staff members? 100 percent of donations go to our projects in Uganda and occasional staff needs for our staff in Uganda.

May God bless you abundantly and together may we raise awareness for the needs of our children in Uganda and around the world. Our kids need both an academic education as well as a demonstration of living sustainably on the land while caring for the soil and the creatures with whom we share the planet!

A blessed day to you,

Martin Becktell Director, EcoMercy International, US 501c3 Charity EcoMercy.org

“Permaculture gives us a toolkit for moving from a culture of fear and scarcity to one of love and abundance.” - Toby Hemenway

"With us everything should be secondary compared to our concern with children, and their upbringing in the instruction and teaching of the Lord." - St. John Chrysostom (347-407)

An example of a wall with a planter box in front of it:

A rough sketch of what we want to create:

This sign is currently all that marks the entrance to the school:

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