The new Kitengesa Community Library before, during & after construction

The Kitengesa Community Library Project is the brainchild of Emmanuel Mawanda, headmaster and director of Kitengesa Comprehensive Secondary School, and of Kate Parry, a professor in the Department of English at Hunter College, City University of New York. Kate has a home near Kitengesa and met Mawanda when doing research on literacy there.

The project began in April 1999 as a tin box containing 161 books.

Most were short paperbacks written in simple English although there were 27 Luganda books as well. Over the following months and years the collection was gradually expanded, reaching 456 items by August 2001. Lucy Namwanje was appointed librarian from the outset, her job being to travel to Kitengesa Comprehensive Secondary School once a week to lend the books to the school students and to maintain the records. Borrowers could keep a book as long as they liked, provided that they returned it before borrowing a new one, and they were encouraged to take the books home to read aloud or lend to people there.

At the end of 2000 the United Nations One per Cent for Development Fund donated $2932 for the construction of a library building. The building was completed by the middle of 2002 and was officially opened on 22nd June, initiating a new phase of the project. The collection was expanded further, to 783 books, and Daniel Ahimbisibwe joined the team as a second librarian (he has since taken over most of the responsibility for the day to day running of the library). People from outside the school were invited to join as members, on payment of a small registration fee, and while students and staff of Kitengesa Comprehensive Secondary School remained the majority, non-school members have become steadily more numerous.

In 2004 the library received a further grant from the One Per Cent Fund of $3650 for installing solar panels on the roof of the building, and an additional solar panel was added in 2005 thanks to the fundraising efforts of Pat Duffy at the United Nations. With electric light powered by the solar panels, the library could be open at night, and the records (which are on a computer database) could be maintained by Dan on the spot. Because of the increased amount of work, a library scholarship scheme was introduced in 2004. Students who are selected as scholars have their school fees paid by donors and in return work for up to ten hours a week in the library.

Meanwhile the library’s collection was steadily expanded. In October 2004 the National Library of Uganda sent a donation of 343 books that it had received from International Book Aid. Individual donors contributed others, while Kate, with Dan’s help, purchased more locally. After purchases made in July 2007 the collection stood at more than 3000 volumes. Since 2004, thanks to the initiation of subscriptions by donors David Mulindwa and Bonny Norton, the library has also offered newspapers, and these have proved to be a great attraction.

In 2004 the University of British Columbia’s Youth Millenium Project (since renamed You Lead) became involved in the library. Its Director of Research and Education, Shelley Jones, spent 2004-5 in Kitengesa doing research on literacy among women and girls there. She arranged for YouLead to buy land next to the library and to build a house on it for Dan, together with a house to accommodate student volunteers whom YouLead now sends to Kitengesa on a regular basis. The volunteers work in various projects, but they all use the library.

Also in 2004, Valeda Dent and Lauren Yannotta joined Kate Parry in the Hunter College Kitengesa Community Library Research Project, while Bonny Norton (who is a professor at the University of British Columbia) initiated research on the use of textbooks in the school. All these projects were presented at the 4th Pan African Conference on Reading for All in Swaziland in August 2005, and work on all of them is continuing.

Thus from a box of books the Kitengesa Community Library has grown into a significant local institution and a center for research that links it with an international scholarly community. It is a testament to how powerful and productive collaboration between people in Africa on the one hand and in North America on the other can be.