Butempa is a rural community school in the Mkushi area of Zambia. There is no government school within two hours walk, so the community decided to set up their own. Until 2008, it catered for up to 600 students with just two classrooms. This all changed when Build It International secured the funding to build two new classrooms and an office.

A community planning workshop was held with an architect from Lusaka. The result was the first version of our now trademark hexagonal classroom. It was built with interlocking stabilised soil blocks and Parry roof tiles. The Butempa community is proud of their school. They have every reason to feel good because the end result is stunning.

At the opening ceremony Mr. Ngoma from Ministry of Education Provincial office said in his speech, ‘this beautiful school is too nice to be in a rural place like Butempa!’.

We disagree. We think Butempa Community should have a great school; they worked extremely hard to achieve it.

Since completion, the Ministry assigned Head teacher, Mr. Moonga and agreed to post three more trained teachers to Butempa. In return the community has renovated a number of houses to provide accommodation.