2019 - Rorya, Tanzania

Dear friends, thank you for taking time to opening up this blog. Welcome to any new viewers and welcome back for those who have been following my blog for a while. Below, I will share a bit about the work in partnership with the Anglican church in Rorya, Tanzania

Figure 1: photo of existing classroom in Rorya District, Tanzania (photo credit: Dan Tintzman, EMI Electrical Engineer volunteer)

Here are some thoughts coming home from my trip to Tanzania. We were there as part of the Engineering Ministries International (EMI) team to design a school campus that included a primary, secondary, high school and vocational school all on one 15 acre campus. The site is in Rorya District; a very rural community of northern Tanzania very close to the border with Kenya. 

There is a great need for schools in these rural areas of Tanzania. Public school sizes in these areas are officially 40 students to 1 teacher. 

While in most communities in North America, parents would be up in arms if class sizes were greater than 20 to 25 students (30 students plus would be outrageous, no?) But due to lack of public schools, most schools in this rural area of Tanzania are forced to seat more than 40 students into one class. In fact, it is not uncommon for 80 to 120 students (or more!) to be squeezed into a classroom designed to seat only 40 students. It is also not uncommon for students to walk 5 to 10 km a day to reach these schools. Only the lucky ones get to ride a bike to school:

Figure 2: (photo credit: Tobias Wong, EMI intern)

It is also interesting to note that most of the students are just happy to have the opportunity to be at school. They know that education is the most probable way to have a life outside of poverty. "ELIMU NI UFUNGUO WA MAISHA" means "Education is the key to life:"

Figure 3: (photo credit: Dan Chong, EMI project leader)

A significant portion of the burden has been placed on local churches like the one we are serving (The Rorya Diocese of the Anglican Church of Tanzania) to build more schools. That is the reason why we are here: to help design the masterplan for the Bishop Adiema Institute of Science and Technology (BAIST).

Quite a lot of our work starts with the site investigation which includes surveying of the site to determine and mark the property boundaries. We all walk the site on the first day as a team, then the surveyor and Civil Engineers visit the site on subsequent days to survey the topography, study how the soil drains and test the water quality:

Figure 4: EMI volunteer surveyor Roy Farley (photo credit: Tobias Wong, EMI intern)

The rest of the EMI design team sits down with the host ministry to get a better understanding of the vision for the project and to better understand how God has led them to love the community that they are called to live in and serve:

Figure 5: EMI programming the site plan (photo credit: Dan Chong, EMI project leader)

From there, we design the site to make sure all the program fits, phase the project, and then redesign the site again to hone the design work and layout.

Figure 6: EMI programming the site plan (photo credit: Emily Yoon, EMI designer)

Our structural engineer typically does a lot of the building materials research to better understand what local building materials are available to us and in what sizes. Additionally, he also does some work in figuring out the proposed structural design and how best to do this so that buildings are well structured for the geographic area we find ourselves in. Many times this is an exercise of understanding confined masonry (which is slightly different in every country). Our guiding verse about the need to build stronger buildings comes from Matthew 7:24.

Figure 6&7: EMI volunteer structural engineer David Inlow investigating concrete blocks (photo credit: Tobias Wong, EMI intern)

The building layout of the site plan is inspired by what we saw in the neighbouring villages and schools that we visited. Communities in this rural area of Tanzania tend to be organized to accomplish two very specific things:

1) In a hot and arid environments, it is important to lay out buildings to take advantage of the naturally occurring breeze. Buildings should not crowd each other to hinder flow of cross ventilation.

2) Buildings can be organized in a way to create courtyards. The negative space is as important as the positive space. Courtyards are used for gathering and protected place for children to play.

As westerners, courtyards in used in this way may be more foreign to us, But we should be reminded about courtyards as "Defensible Space" as described by the famous Urban Planner and activist, Jane Jacobs. In her book, the death and life of great American Cities, she argues how the automobile, cars and streets have destroyed the smaller scale protected urban spaces that our children used to use for play. Can you relate?
This is one of the reasons why planning is different in majority world context than it is in a more North American context:

Figure 8: Site plan as developed in Tanzania, but continues to be developed as we return home to North America (hand rendering by Dan Chong, EMI project leader)

As a welcoming community site, high fences around the perimeter is not needed like in other majority world countries where safety and security is more of an issue. The entry gates will be designed for security, but the property  boundaries are more transparent and offer a more welcoming glimpse into the project site:

Figure 9: Example of an typical security gate in this area of Tanzania (photo credit: Dan Chong, EMI project leader)

Figure 10: Proposed Entry gate to the site (rendering by Emily Yoon, EMI designer)

Finally, our presentation to the local community and stakeholders was too big to be inside Bishop John Adiema's house which he graciously offered to let us use as our "office" away from home. We therefore had to present outdoors once it was dark enough to use a projector outside:

Figure 11: Friday night presentation (photo credit: Tobias Wong, EMI intern)

Figure 12: EMI project team in front of Bishop John's house. 

Back row: Tobias Wong (EMI Intern), Doug McCracken (Sr. Civil Engineer), Dan Tintzman (Sr. Electrical Engineer), David Newton (EMI Intern), David Inlow (Sr. Structural Engineer), Roy Farley (Surveyor), Professor Robert  Kisusu

Front row: Evelyne Nthenya (Jr. Electrical Engineer), Emily Yoon (Designer), Dan Chong (EMI project leader), Kelvin John, Rev. Donald Okumu, Lisa Ehli (Architect), Jeff Ehli (Business Development).

Figure 13: Photo credit: David Inlow

Thank you for reading to the end, goodbye for now.