Exciting times!

These last couple of months have seen huge progress in both the finishing of building work at our Vocational Training Centre and the beginning of using the teaching and workshop facilities there. As soon as we laid the floor in the workshop and had (temporary) power lines in, we have been swamped with people who already want us to service and fix their cars. The timing has been somewhat of a challenge as our team leader (and the actual mechanic on the team!) went home to Germany for 4 months. Ahhhhhh! However, Rich's 'bodge it' know how accumulated over years of tinkering with mini's and some local workers experience is tiding us over for the time being although we are having to limit the number of cars we get in.

On top of all this, we have recently started up some trial classes in computers and English conversation. Jason is our computer guy and he has spent ages looking over the curriculum and figuring out what to teach these guys. Although enthusiasm has certainly not been lacking, he has encountered other problems. For example, apart from the fact that some of the students have very limited literacy skills, these guys have absolutely no idea how a mouse works and even the simple navigation around the computer screen has been a huge challenge for them. In fact Jason told us that he imagined teaching a class of grandparents would be roughly equivalent!! Here are a couple of pictures taken during the second lesson ever!

Interest in the classes is HUGE and there are always people turning up to ask if they can join classes (in fact they tell us that they need to be in the class!). So our next task is to figure out when classes will start proper and get the application forms out.

As I said, these are exciting times but they are also a little overwhelming which is hardly surprising as we are trying to start up a school and a business! We are continually praying for wisdom and insight as we navigate local culture and politics whilst maintaining our goal of bringing high quality education to those on our Island who otherwise would not have this opportunity. EXCITING!!!