Babati Link Group
The Babati Link Group (BLG) is an educational link between King Edward VI Five Ways School, Birmingham, England and Bagara Secondary School, Babati, Manyara, Tanzania. Formed in 2003, it exists to promote friendship and share educational resources between the two schools. So far, Babati Day has benefited from new facilities such as renovation of several classroom blocks and the donation of books and other teaching resources. More importantly, both parties have benefited from the opportunity to meet and make friends with people from different cultures, and to experience those cultures by visiting each other's schools.
During the group's existence there have been several key visits made by parties from both schools, including:
- The inaugural trip by students and staff from Five Ways in 2003
- A brief visit by FW pupils as part of World Challenge Kilimanjaro 2004
- A summer excursion of 2005 by FW pupils and staff
- Exchanges of Babati Day staff in 2003 and 2005
- In the summer of 2006, a small team of present and former pupils traveled to Babati to construct a computer science department at Babati day - the most ambitious phase of the link to date.
- A group of 28 students from KEFW visited Babati in the summer of 2007 to carry out maintenance work and teach English and I.T.
During the summer of 2014, a group of 25 year 11 and 12 students made the trip to Babati. Whilst over there pupils instated a house system, similar to KEFW's.
The Babati Link group is fully dependent on donations to survive.