Offaly men building a school hall in South African township

Birr woman Sharon Conneely recently held a fundraiser in St Brendan's RC Church for the Streetwise project which is building a multipurpose school hall in the township of Delft near Cape Town in South Africa and in which her husband Oisin Conneely is taking part.

Oisin and several other volunteers from Birr and surrounding areas recently travelled to Delft where they will stay for about six weeks lending their skills and elbow grease to this great cause.

Amongst them is Neil McDermott, an architect from Birr, Peter Lyons, a Rath man who works as an architect in Tullamore, Mark Kennedy, who works as a truck driver in Grennan's Rath, and Kieran Corrigan, who is in Sales & Marketing in Rath. Oisin's trade is carpentry.

Speaking to the Midland Tribune from the building site in Delft, Peter Lyons said this is the third phase of a three phase project. “The school is run by the Salesian Sisters,” he said. “In the first phase, back in 2011, we built a creche on the site, for pre-school children; in 2018 we built a skills training centre for post-school children; and now we are building a multipurpose hall which will be used by both the pre and post school children.

“We are getting on well here. We are being looked after well. We stay on site during the day and drive home to our accommodation in the evening, which is outside of Delft near Cape Town.” He pointed out that it's not advisable to venture outside the building site and go into the town, especially after dark, because it has a big problem with drugs and violence and there are gangs in the area who can turn aggressive and violent. Like many shanty towns in South Africa, Delft has a serious law and order issue. This makes the good work of the Salesian Sisters and these Offaly men even more important because they are bringing some stability and decency to a volatile and difficult environment.

“We have thirteen men from Delft working with us on the building site,” continued Peter. “They are hard workers and we get on very well with them. We plan to finish in about six weeks time, in November.

“The work is challenging because it is a short timescale. Because of the short timescale we planned and prepared for it as best we could in advance. Overall, it's going pretty well at the moment.”

The Salesian Sisters say every child has great potential, both academically and as a caring, decent human being, and they want to bring out that potential through their schools. They call their creche the Don Bosco Educare School. This and the skills training centre, the Sisters say, provide vital services to the community in the surrounding township.

“Our project commenced in 2010,” they comment, “and is now nearing completion with the construction this year of the shared, multipurpose hall and additional classroom space. We are very grateful to the Irish volunteer group Streetwise for providing invaluable assistance with the project.”

In the creche / Educare school about 200 children attend each year. Peter said the skills training centre offers the equivalent of PLC courses in Ireland where undertaking the various courses and skills training aids the students in their subsequent quest to gain employment.

The Salesian Sisters are trying to fundraise for the project. If you would like to make a donation to this special cause then please email bursar@salesiansisters.net for more information.