HASTE was started by the late Marjorie Warwick. Marjorie was a regular holidaymaker in The Gambia who was struck by the lack of provision of education to Gambian children. The need was particularly great among the under sevens, for whom there is no state education provided. On her travels around the country she was impressed by the children she met who, despite this, showed great intelligence and willingness to learn.
Marjorie was determined to help them. She organised the local community in Abuko village to donate land to build a school on and collected money in the UK for the building. She opened Abuko Nursery School back in October 1997. At that time it was just a structure with a roof – just two classrooms and a headmaster’s office. Sadly Marjorie died before she had had the opportunity to provide anything else for the school but, after her death, Judith Hughes took on HASTE’s work. In 2000 she registered HASTE officially as a charity.
In 2006 we were joined by Cathy Long, who had been doing similar work in Kenya and Uganda. Soon after that Sarah Warwick and Fiona Ferguson also joined as trustees. Today HASTE has built 8 schools and provided educational materials for four more.
I visited Kenya last year it is such a beautiful country. I saw children walking long distances to school, more schools are urgently needed. I will ask my friends in Japan to help