Edmund Rice College

The Zambia Immersion Project was founded in Edmund Rice College in 2004, by Miss Mairead Magill. The Project is a response to the poverty and injustice in Zambia.

April 2004

In April 2004 Miss Magill went to Zambia on a teachers only Immersion. On her return, the stories spread around the school of the experiences that Miss Magill had. The next stage was to organise a group to journey to Zambia in April 2005.

April 2005

After many months of fundraising the group raised a total of £20,000. Many students and teachers including Miss Magill, Mr Gough (Principal) and Sheena Woods all went to Livingstone for two weeks.

February 2007

In February 2007, 14 Volunteers, 7 Students, 3 Past Pupils and 4 Leaders journeyed to Zambia on 9th February to spend two weeks in a developing nation.

However, to get to this, we needed to raise funds to bring and distribute to the organisations functioning in both Livingstone and Lusaka. Our aim was to raise £21,000. But, we exceeded this and after almost 9 months of fundraising, the team raised a staggering £35,200.

The team raised this money through organising such events as:

• Christmas Bazaar
• A Night at the Races
• Bag Packing
• Generous Donations from the community
• Parish Speeches
• St Brigid Cross Making

Whilst in Zambia, the group spent one week in Livingstone, teaching in a variety of community schools and also the team spent time teaching in the St Lawrence Community Centre in Lusaka. Here we taught Maths, Literacy, Music and Creative Activities (Art).

(Grade 6C, St Lawrence Centre)

Also, in Livingstone we worked in the St Francis Day Care Centre. This centre was established to bring HIV/AIDs, medication to the patients in the local compounds such as Chipata and Maramba. This centre is headed by Sister Mary and helping her along with this is Sisters Sheila and Sister Connie shown in the photograph.

During the second week, we spent most of our time working in the St Lawrence Centre as well as in the Kabwata Orphanage where we played and interacted with the children. At the St Lawrence Centre, some volunteers worked in the Special Needs Centre and community school, whilst others worked on the Piggery, clearing the land and the digging the foundations.

On the last day of Immersion  in Lusaka, we had a football match. Ireland v Zambia. However, we failed terribly against Zambia, despite the fact that some were playing in bare feet.

 The final score was 4-2 to Zambia!

At the end of the match we swapped over our Antrim jerseys which were kindly donated by Mr Sean Fleming.

We departed Zambia on Saturday 9th February at 06.40 and arrived in Belfast at 21:05 with many wonderful experiences that we could all not wait to tell family and friends!