Global Grant

Summary: A remote elementary school outside San Jose, Mindoro with almost 500 students and a high school with almost 1,000. Problem: water and sanitation. They have a good well, but only a single hosepipe, 150 meters from the closest building, from which students can fill buckets and bottles. There is no distribution. There are only 6 CR’s for elementary school and similar for high school, all of which just drain to nearby ditches; there is no septic disposal. All students have to carry at least 3L each day for minimal hand wash and toilet flush. The school site is huge (4.7 hectares) and used for whole-island scouting jamborees and multiple school district events such as various competitions. There are no showers, and obviously grossly inadequate cr’s, so everybody simply squats in adjacent fields. Scouts have to bring tankers.

Solution: purchase and install roof top tanks, pipes to building, build cr’s for elementary classrooms etc, gang lavies for high school, gang and outside showers for sporting/scouting events. Install septic system with leach lines. Technical details and cost estimates are now being prepared pro bono, courtesy of PDG Alex Cureg by his lead project Engineer. This has the potential to be our first Global Grant in a very long time.

Background: I was invited to visit two sites by a Past President of RC San Jose Tamaraw, which had been endorsed by PDG Obet Pagdanganan, who had seen the sites while on Governor’s visits to Mindoro clubs, as well as COS Cesar Ubaldo. I introduced the concept to our club’s BOD last month, who approved investigation and potential application of our club’s District Designated Grant plus a few hundred dollars more, if it panned out. Gov. Ernest Yuyek also expressed preliminary interest and possible additional District Funds.

The first site visited was a huge water tower erected in 1928 for one of the first and largest sugar mills in the country. Long since shuttered and sugar facilities demolished, the 18-meter tall tower, constructed of French Iron, still stands, long unused. The initial idea was to restore the tower and build a pipeline to the District Hospital, which sometimes experiences shortages during summer months. The problems that we encountered were three-fold. First, the tower is so badly rusted and deteriorated that it would require total replacement, except for a part of the tank. Second, it turned out that the district hospital was more than five kilometers away, which would require a massive piping project. Finally, the hospital has its own well only 300 meters away and on-site storage tanks. The DOH just needs to replace some deteriorated well casing to solve the only occasional problem.

The second site visited was the massive grounds of the school, surrounded by rice fields as far as the eye could see. The elementary and senior high schools have growing populations. They are separated only by a fence and a little distance. We were there on a Saturday, so there were no classes in session, but the band was practicing and we had an opportunity to talk with the teacher and learn about the everyday difficulties of the students and the staff. It turned out that the principal was also on site, professionally dressed and hard at work in her office. She was delighted with our surprise visit and with the potential of a project that would so dramatically improve the welfare of the entire community.

There is a new three-story high classroom building under construction for the high school, to accommodate K-12, but, much to our surprise, it is being built without any CR’s! It is, however, an ideal location for installation of water tanks to provide gravity feed distribution of fresh water to the various buildings. Nearby, there are a couple of World War II era buildings, one of which (pictured here) could be rehabilitated and adapted to have separate gang showers for boys and girls. These facilities are sorely needed, especially by the high school, for the multi-district competitions, and by the scouting organizations that have their Jamborees on site.

It is our intention to gather additional details and preliminary estimates of the costs of each significant aspect of the project. Additional consultations will be held with the school and DOE official, the Barangay officials, the Boy Scout regional leaders, and other authorities as appropriate. We will then draft a TRF Global Grant Proposal for various levels of reviews and approvals and to seek the literal buy-in of foreign clubs. Global Grants must have a minimum budget of USD$30,000. This project could easily be three times that amount. Obviously, it is going to take a lot more time and effort to bring it to possible fruition, but it is clearly worthwhile. It would be a major accomplishment for our club finally to lead a major Global Grant after so many years without any. I promise my best efforts to bring this credit to our club.