Projects Secondary School One of the most ambitious projects to date has been the building and opening of the secondary school. This will allow all our orphans to have free secondary education of the highest standard. The capacity of the school will exceed the number of orphans and thirty percent of the pupils will pay for their schooling which will help fund the maintenance and running of the school. The government will be providing teachers of a high standard, with the lowest student to teacher ratio in the country. The school has been open since January 2008 and currently we have 168 students and six classes and we are looking forward to many more children joining in the new year. The aim is to have two libraries, two laboratories, and sixteen classrooms of forty students. This is a very important initiative as it will offer the highest standard of education to our children at no cost. Farms Over the past ten years we have started making progress on income generating projects by establishing two arable farms, one animal farm and two maize mills. Training Skills and Development Centre A Training Skills and Development Centre was established one year ago within the village with the purpose of providing practical skills to the villagers and selected older children in the care of the orphan project. These skills include welding, electrical installation, carpentry and motor vehicle mechanics.The centre equips the students with new skills allowing them to gain employment within their specialist areas or set up their own businesses. The students train at the centre for a period of one year and if successful they graduate with a Grade Three Trade Test Certificate, a recognised qualification within Malawi. Microloans are made availble as necessary to graduates so that they can obtain tools with which to ply their new-found trade. This year we successfully graduated 20 students. Maize Mill As a result of supplying the villagers with treadle pumps for irrigation and introducing them to elementary husbandry techniques, the poorer villagers are now able to grow enough maize to sustain themselves and their dependants. Hence the need for substantially enlarged milling capacity. These people regularly faced famine previously but now there is often a surplus of flour for sale. Farms There is a four hectare site beside the Shire River where maize and beans are grown to feed the children and where there is an experiment currently under way to try sorghum and onions. Some of the food is surplus and is sold to fund running costs at the orphan project. There is a second farm site close to the orphan centre which is used as training land to teach the villagers how best to grow their food.  This food is also used to feed the orphans. There is a further site devoted to animals - some forty cattle and twenty goats.  Surplus milk is sold to the local dairy. Soft Loans We are providing soft loans to guardians for the orphans and orphan headed households to improve their livelihood and that of the orphans, and give them an incentive to keep the orphans in a family setting. Counselling Centre We are providing a counselling and loans programme run by Christine for teenage mothers and abused girls.  It is part of the mission to encourage girls to get educated and to give them independence from the single mother/early marriage alternative. In a society where openness about sex is rare this initiative is in the forefront of the fight against AIDs. Primary and Secondary Education Primary education in Malawi is free, however we provide text and exercise books to all our primary school children.  We also support all our older children by paying their secondary education fees and we are in the process of building our own secondary school (please see News and Events for more information) Medical Care At present about 10% of the orphans are HIV positive and are receiving anti-retroviral drugs funded by the government.  If taken properly these are very effective. Large numbers of extended family members are also HIV positive. Some of these have difficulty in adhering to the programme of medication. While the staff and volunteers seek to monitor the use of these drugs and the condition of those affected, there is a need for a resident nurse at the orphan centre to administer drugs and give advice. We are currently trying to fill this post although it will be a challenge to find the funds in view of the rates nurses can command because of the dire shortage of nurses in Malawi.