This project has been initiated to raise funds to build a Pre-School and Community Centre for underprivileged children and people in one of the poorest Townships in Grahamstown South Africa. For the last two years we have been fund raising to fulfil this aim.

After many enquiries we realised the true cost of building a facility from scratch would be £75,000 - quite a significant sum but we were not in the least deterred!

Through some good fortune an opportunity arose last year to purchase an existing property which was on the edge of the plot that we had already acquired for this purpose.

It was decided by the Trustees that we should buy the property and convert it into a pre-school in the interim, whilst our main goal was still in the process of being realised. We were able to do this with help from the friends of Rainbow Kidz - our sponsors. We wanted to get the children into the new pre-school with proper facilities.

On April 16th 2007, Mary (Patron of Rainbow Kidz) visited Grahamstown to officially open the school. It was a very special event with over one hundred township people attending, the Town Mayor´s representative, the Bishop's representative and the town´s Chief planning officer to name a few. Select Education UK also sent a representative to present us with a generous cheque! The school now has two large classrooms with proper facilities and was officially opened on the 20th of April 2007. Forty children now attend.

We did this to enable children to move in with proper facilities and this will have demonstrated our commitment to the local township community.

Work in progress:

• we are looking to build a fence around the adjoining plot, so it can be used as a playground and form part of the new Pre-School.
• we will continue to fund raise to fulfil our vision of building a dedicated Pre-School/ Community Centre on the plot, but we still need in excess of £40,000 to complete the project.