Paving the Way Phase 1 of the big landscaping project at Uphill Junior School is underway! In Scotland we might call the body of water that forms at the front of the school each time it rains the “Uphill Lochan’ (a small lake or pond). Not an ideal entrance feature, and one that needs to […]
Infrastructure at Uphill: The Final Step(s) Uphill Junior School lives up to its name as our school site is anything but flat, a reflection of the wonderful geography of the surrounding landscape in the crater lakes area of west Uganda, bordering the Kibale Forest. The landscape around Uphill is not the only spectacular feature – […]
The 12 PCs of Christmas! IT skills are essential for today’s children and adults. Only 25% of Ugandan teachers have a basic understanding of computer use and only 10% have the skills to use computers to enhance their lesson planning and teaching. For pupils in rural schools, lack of electricity, IT equipment and functional internet […]
Walking on Water Way back in 2014, Newport Brownies – accompanied by a crowd of friends, families, and the Newport Church Sunday Club – held a sponsored walk across the Tay Bridge. They were hoping to raise enough money to buy what would be the very first rainwater harvesting tank for Uphill Junior School in […]
A New Kindergarten for Uphill This is the story of ten years in the life of a rural Ugandan school building. These days we in the west are all being encouraged to reuse or recycle to cut back on waste, and help reduce climate change. In Uganda, our experience is that before anything is thrown […]
Welcome to the Uphill Christmas Appeal 2024! This year our appeal is all about water… When it rains in our corner of Uganda it really, really rains. We are talking serious, soaked-in-seconds downpours! Take a look at the video captured on one of our visits in 2018: Just for good measure, there are two […]
Our 2023 Christmas Appeal is about toilets (again). Uphill Junior School urgently needs a new toilet facility for staff and visitors! We built the current ‘temporary’ long drop latrine in 2018 and it is no longer fit for purpose. It is in the wrong place, the pit is almost full and there are only 2 […]
Are you sitting comfortably..? The youngest children at Uphill are three years old when they start in Baby Class. At the moment, the desks they have are the same size as those used by the older pupils. As you can imagine, these little ‘uns are dwarfed by the desks. The aim of our 2022 Christmas […]
After the disruptions of the past two years, Scotland’s Kiltwalk returned to action fully in 2022. It was really great to be able to sign up, along with family and friends, for the Dundee Kiltwalk on the 21st August. For the last few years Kiltwalk has been a fantastic fundraiser for the Uphill Trust. Provided you […]
During the extended COVID lockdowns in 2020/21, many of the children at Uphill were hungry, and unfortunately they are still hungry now. Crop yields on their small shambas (subsistence farms) are down, and getting enough to eat is a continuing challenge for too many of the school families. Providing a hot meal in school for […]
What the school catering staff would really like for Christmas is a new kitchen for Uphill.
Six Uphill Kiltwalkers took to the streets of Glasgow on Sunday 26 September 2021 for the first live Kiltwalk since 2019.
Running 5km a day for 30 days straight doesn’t sound too bad, especially for two young fit firefighters. Now add 34kg of firefighting kit including breathing apparatus and still run 5km each day in around 30 minutes. That is some challenge. This was the torture devised for themselves by two of Hereford and Worcester’s firefighters, […]
Looking for something to do to keep myself busy during lockdown, I started sorting out my fabric store, and my thoughts drifted to “What can I make with this stash of fabric?” So it was convenient that, almost at the same time, the government announced that wearing non-medical fabric face masks was advisable to help […]
Earlier this month, while posho (ground maize) and soap bars were being handed out to the Uphill Junior School families (see COVID 19 Food Relief 1), it became clear that other households in the wider community were also in need of food relief. School bursar Ramuel and Director Elius travelled around the neighbourhood and found […]
We received a fabulous response to our COVID 19 food crisis appeal in April, both in donations and as sponsorship for the Uphill 2.6 Challenge, which enabled us to send £1467 to the school to purchase essential food supplies plus hand washing soap for the Uphill families.The COVD 19 food relief project was overseen by […]
On Sunday 26 April 2020 – the day the London Marathon would have taken place – charitable folks across the UK will be getting active – in a lock-down friendly way – to raise money for their favourite charities. Say hello to the 2.6 Challenge! Never one to pass up a fundraising opportunity trustee Liddy […]
Esther Isobel Searles, nee Duncan, 1931-2017 Isobel met Jock and Eileen Macdonald, our Chairman’s parents, at Dollar Academy and they became life-long friends. When she learned about the fledging school in 2013 she started to support the project with one-off donations and was always eager to hear updates on progress and see pictures of the […]
Encouraging the children and staff at Uphill Junior School to wash their hands after using the latrine and before eating has been a top priority for The Uphill Trust since our first trustee visit in 2015. Currently the school has three small hand washing tanks dotted around the school grounds and they are well used, […]
Event Report by Fundraising Trustee, Liddy A year after my inaugural Kiltwalk with the fab bunch of Uphill supporters who made up Team Uphillya, I signed up for the Dundee Kiltwalk again. This time I wasn’t able to do a huge amount of pre-walk training so I opted for the Wee Wander, 6 miles, starting […]
