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When we first started GondarLink, at the beginning of 1996, it was the Challoner's - Fasiledes link that was our first and single concern. Dr Challoner's is a selective grammar school in the heart of leafy and advantaged Buckinghamshire in England and it was an honour and a delight to be making close ties with another school in a very contrasted part of the world. Chris Grant and his wife Liz had visited the Fasiledes School in Gondar at the end of 1995 and it had become immediately clear that there was here potential for long-term friendship and support. Since those early days, Fasiledes has been divided into two totally independent schools. Fasiledes Preparatory School caters for students throughout Gondar who have gained a pass standard in public exams at the age of 15-16 and who are considered to have the potential for university education. Fasiledes General Secondary School next door is one of several Gondar schools that prepares students for those public exams and, as such, is a feeder school for Fasiledes Preparatory. The Director of Fasiledes Preparatory School is Baye Mekuria but the main link teacher at the Preparatory School is Ferede Enyew, a teacher of English and a man who, from the very start, has shown an understanding of what the link was trying to do. Without his caring and attention, the link would certainly not have progressed in the secure way that it has.
Letter-writing and books were our first two focuses for this link. It was not long before we had over a hundred Gondar students writing to Challoner's pupils and telling of their experiences and their feelings. Thousands of books have been brought from England for the Fasiledes library over the years, and these have now been shared with the Fasiledes Secondary School. We even had the British Royal Air Force honour GondarLink by delivering a special consignment of books into Addis Ababa for the Fasiledes library. Some of the many more recent and ambitious activities of this senior link have included the building of a luxurious 200-seater Lecture Hall in the grounds of the Fasiledes Preparatory School, the provision of much new furniture to replace ancient and broken units in the classrooms, the purchase of a sophisticated and hugely useful printing machine that has revolutionised the production of exam papers and other school paperwork, and, most recently, the opening of a new staff resource centre. If you are interested in following the past development of this link - and GondarLink as a whole - then a trawl through the newsletters archive on this site is a worthwhile, if time-consuming, activity! Have you signed our Guestbook? Email | Top
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Challoner's, Fasiledes, Amersham, Buckinghamshire