Project: Muong Thin Primary School

Location: Tuan Giao district
Time: Jul - Sep 2018
Status (updated): completed

Tuan Giao is a rural district of the mountainous Dien Bien province in the northwest region of Vietnam. The area is one of the most beautiful, unaffected and untouristed areas of Vietnam, but also one of the poorest. Muong Thin primary school is in Muong Thin commune, which is 17 kilometers far from the district center.

Muong Thin primary school consists of a big school site and two smaller school sites with a total 15 classes and 330 students. The big school site has 235 students in which, 57 of them are boarding students. At present, the two old boarding rooms are very small (12 m2/each room), cramped, and very old. They were wet, overloaded and in bad condition with broken glass windows. When we visited the school site last May, we could see two or three kids were sharing one small bed. The school and Muong Thin commune cannot afford to build the new boarding house for the kids because of no money. Understanding the difficulties of the school site and the community, VFE decided to finance and choose Muong Thin primary school is our new project in Dien Bien province.

According to the local education department, students in grade three from smaller school sites will be gathered and studied at the big school site in the next years. At present, there are 57 boarding students staying in two rooms (12m2 each room). In the next year (2019), there are more 22 boarding students. And for the next two years (2020), the boarding student is 99 in total.
The old rooms of the school cannot have enough space for the total of 99 students in the next two years. Therefore, Muong Thin primary school really need more boarding rooms so that the kids from smaller and further school sites can stay and study in center school site with a better studying condition.

The project in Muong Thin center school site includes:

05 boarding rooms (24m2/each room);
a warehouse (12m2), a kitchen (12m2);
rail, electrical system, stairs;
The new construction is an assemble construction, which follows the standard drawing for Japanese building style.

Muong Thin primary school really need more boarding rooms so that the kids from smaller school sites can stay and study in the big school site with a better studying condition. The five new boarding rooms will bring more 120 m2 space for the kids (24m2 each room). Each room has six double-storey beds (six bunk beds).

The community, the school are very supported our project. The Muong Thin commune commits to be responsible for ground clearance. The costs incurred of ground clearance, the community agrees to finance. The school commits to mobilize the teachers to refurbish the two boarding rooms and the bathroom. The teacher will re-paint all walls, replace the new ceiling and broken windows.
Parents and local people commit to joining in ground clearance of the school site.

VFE are very happy to have contribution and support from the local education department, Muong Thin commune, and Muong Thin primary school.