Aside from normal maintenance of the school’s grounds, it seems that wherever the eye moves, there’s an improvement that could be made.

For example, Volunteers Steve, Warren and Josh, with Joe Bill, our Groundskeeper and some of the locals recently closed in part of our ‘shelter’ turning it into a tool shed .

Warren and Josh hard at work

They concreted the floor, closed in a section with corrogated iron walls and timber shelves and put up a lockable door. Joe Bill was delighted.

Steve spreads concrete while Joe Bill mixes it

The same band of helpers also busied themselves making more desks and stools for the older students.We only need desks for the Prep class now.

Steve savouring island life after a hard day at the office

Early in 2011, Tropical Cyclones Vania and Atu passed near the school. Fortunately, the only damage incurred was to a couple of the long-drop toilets, which had tin roofs and thatch walls blown down. Joe Bill, our Groundskeeper, made temporary repairs to them, and when volunteers showed up a couple of months later, longer-lasting repairs were done and a couple more were replaced. Joe Bill, Josh, Steve and Warren did a fantastic job here.

We have also completed Stage 1 of a library. Andrew, Joe Bill and other helpers built it into an area of the first building which once served as the Fieldworker’s room. With that completed we then emptied the many boxes of books we had been storing, sorted, categorised and stacked them onto the new shelving. We were amazed at how many books and reading materials we had shipped over the last couple of years from Australia.

A few of the library's first customers

The library has a rich variety of children’s titles, issues of magazines such as National Geographic, encyclopedias and young people’s novels. Borrowers are not permitted to take the books away, but must read them in the library returning them to the stacks when they leave. So far as we know, this is the only public library anywhere on the island of Tanna.