Our construction work from preschool to middle schools
Our association has built, between 2008 and 2015, 40 classrooms in five schools within Mbour: École Natangué, the Zone Sonatel Elementary School, the Mbour Sérère middle school, the Coumba Dinding Sonko School and the Cheikh Amadou Lô school.
École Natangué, our flagship constructed in 2008-2009
The view from the preschool classrooms at École Natangué
The history of our school is unique. It replaced livestock pens and a reeking trash dump. The land was donated by the Mayor’s office, and our association, with the help of many sponsors, has built a school invaluable to the neighborhood. Our Natangué community now forms (in order of construction) our association’s office, a community park, the school, a small business and work training center, and a medical clinic. Natangué has become a dynamic space appreciated by the local population.
Our school at Natangué includes:
- a 4-classroom preschool
- a 6-classroom elementary school
- a building reserved for mothers in the Natangué community with a sewing shop, a kitchen, multi-purpose spaces, 8 computers and a projector, the office of École Natangué’s headmistress,
- clean toilets for the whole community
- a house for the grounds’ caretaker
A public parklet has been built at the entry to the school.
The entry to École Natangué.
The Zone Sonatel elementary school
This school was the first elementary school in the Zone Sonatel district, in the southern part of the city of Mbour.
The school at Zone Sonatel now includes:
- 12 classrooms
- an administrative office
- clean toilets
- a laptop-based computer lab
Our organization has built the toilets and 4 of the 12 classrooms here, and participated in planning the computer lab.
The school yard at the Zone Sonatel elementary school
The medical clinic
École Natangué, from preschool to fifth grade, serves 600 students, with the Zone Sonatel school serving 1,000 students. And thanks to a grant from Regione Lazio and MSD Italia, we were able to build a medical clinic to support the 1,600 students in the area and the community at large.
This medical clinic’s mission is to:
- facilitate and improve continued medical care, immunizations and preventive care, in addition to the yearly medical checkup that every École Natangué student receives
- treat on-site minor but frequent illnesses and injuries that impact the students, reducing the burden on teachers and administrators to accompany ill or injured students to hospitals farther away
- optimize resources at local hospitals by allowing them to only treat graver illnesses and injuries
Work began on the clinic in November 2012, with its opening on March 15, 2013. Its ground floor holds an infirmary, waiting room, two consultation rooms, and a relaxation room. Its upper floor contains residences for the permanent nurses on site and visiting doctors, as well as a rental unit which subsidizes GIE Jigeenu Natangué, the women’s agriculture association based out of Natangué.
The medical clinic
The Coumba Dinding Sonko School
Elementary school students at Coumba Dinding Sonko with their teacher and Elena Malagodi, president of Natangué-Sénégal
The CEM Mbour Sérère Middle School
Classrooms built by Natangué-Sénégal in 2013-14
