Newill Academy _ EN | newillacademy

Anchor 7

The school along with the board of teachers are working hard to provide their best for the pupils, in lack of proper financial background the academy is facing various challenges.

First of all, it is overcrowded, the infrastructure is not sufficient enough for the amount of students.

The children are keen on studying but instead of classrooms they are staying in temporary shelter-like structures exposed to the various weather conditions.

Sanitary facilities also need improvement.

Anchor 1

The story of Newill Academy started in 2010 when Mr. William Newman, a Ghanaian teacher founded a nursery in an empty storage building next to his mother's house in Koforidua. His aim is to provide quality daycare and education for children who suffer social disadvantage in the area, mainly the children of the market sellers and street vendors who can't afford to stay at home with them.

Anchor 2

In order to keep building costs and future maintenance low, locally available materials, handmade structures, passive ventilation and a rainwater harvesting system are included. The bricks are handmade, produced on site by volunteers. Interior elements and parts of the facade are made of bamboo, harvested in the nearby forest. The elevated roof functions as a solar chimney, creating natural air movement when warmed up by the sun.

A group of European architects in close cooperation with the local management have revised the plans in 2016 and soon started the construction works of the low-cost sustainable school building. During the first building phase in 2016 two classrooms and a sanitary block were completed and the walls of two additional classrooms had been raised. These semi-finished classrooms were already in use during the 2016/17 school year, providing better environment for studying.

During the next summer holiday in August 2017 our volunteers had completed the floor slab above the classrooms, added a staircase, erected the walls of the first floor classrooms and harvested and prepared bamboo for the facade. Two more building phases should follow in the next years to complete the academy which provides comfortable and suitable room for the 240 pupils.

We feel that our responsibility as architects is to contribute to the betterment of the built environment for those in need. When the opportunity arose to help Newill Academy with the construction of a more appropriate school building, we were happy to accept the challenge.