In rural Kenya, you don’t see many well built schools. All too frequently, students gather under the welcome shade of a tree to learn, or they sit on the floor in rickety, wood-framed mud huts. Lucky ones might have a few plastic chairs
and they’ll fashion a desk from stones and planks of wood.

Solid stone classrooms are absolutely amazing to walk into, as they’re several degrees cooler than outdoor temperatures. The acoustics are much better too and teachers can deliver lessons without shouting in the open air. All
in all, the learning experience is more comfortable and productive.

John Kadenge, the Headmaster of Kundeni Primary (the first school we helped to build) told us his 600+ students are now attaining exam results that are 14% points higher, across the board. Attendance is better than it has ever been
and the children, who are so hungry for knowledge, are happy to be there; many walk for up to 2 hours to get there and 100 sleep on the premises overnight, because it’s just too far to walk home and there’s a better chance they’ll
get a meal that day, if they stay.

Below, you’ll see a selection of the schools we’re working with, building safe, cool classrooms and providing educational spaces that are occupied by children during the day and after school and at weekends, by the community too. For
every solid stone classroom we build, which costs around £10,000 we plant 4,000 trees either on the school compound or very nearby. They give everyone shade and protection from the weather, reduce damage from flooding, provide
safe habitats for wildlife, produce fruit and nuts for the children and clean the air we breathe all over the world.

By donating to Word Forest and helping us build schools and plant trees, you’re enabling community empowerment on a huge scale. It’s the stuff of legacy and a simple ‘thank you’ just isn’t enough.