Children from a Cardiff Primary School have waved off a special delivery to their link school in Lesotho.
Pupils at Lakeside Primary School have sent some much-needed educational resources to St Gerard’s School in Lesotho having formed a friendship with the school four years ago.
Thanks to local businesses, Lakeside Primary has been able to send children’s books, PE clothing and arts supplies to the 1,200-strong primary school in the town of Mafeteng.
Logistics company Davies, Turner & Co Ltd generously donated container space to ship the resources the 6,000 miles to Lesotho and so the children of Lakeside gathered to wave off the gifts they are sending to their friends in Africa.
St Gerard’s and Lakeside are great global friends and have recently completed enjoyable and enriching exchange visits. Normally the schools communicate through the postal system – St Gerard’s do not have access to the internet yet -which can be a costly and lengthy process as the youngsters eagerly await replies to their letters.
It was during a visit to Cardiff last September that St Gerard’s Vice Principal Mapalesa Mokotjo commented how smart the girls and boys of Lakeside looked in their sports kits. The children at St Gerard’s have netball and football teams but no school kit and so YC Lim, owner of YC Sports on Crwys Road, helped out by supplying 1,000 brand new items of PE kit.
Over 300 children’s fiction and non-fiction English books donated by children and the local community to help stock the St Gerard’s library, which was set up with assistance from Lakeside, are also on their way to Lesotho along with second hand school uniforms and arts resources which are expensive and quite rare commodities in schools in Lesotho where desks, pencils and workbooks take up the majority of the school budgets.
Before waving off their special cargo, the children of Lakeside took part in a school assembly outlining the journey and different types of transport their container would take on its trip south.
Executive Member for Education and Lifelong Learning, Cllr Freda Salway, said: “It’s great to hear about schools, local communities and businesses working together for the benefit of others. This has been a tremendous effort by Lakeside Primary and I’m sure the children and teachers of St Gerard’s in Lesotho will be delighted with their special delivery.
“I’m always pleased to hear about schools forming links with other schools across the world as they can each learn such a lot about each other’s history, tradition and cultures.”
