CHILDREN’S HOME and SCHOOL Magu District, Mwanza Region, Tanzania. E. Africa We are a small team of Christians working together to help the most vulnerable children and people in a rural area of Tanzania. East Africa. We are involved in providing financial support and volunteers to visit both long and short term to share in the work both here and in Tanzania. As of November 2017 caring for a total of 245 children Contact: Graham Pountain email: graham@pountain.net,  Tel 01254 879694
Jan. -  April. 2018 - UPDATE
Greetings from Bethany,  This is our temporary web page due to the fact the old computer failed and at the moment I am unable to update the old pages. However, the old outdated Bethany main index page is here
The Bethany Project (often referred to as the Bethany Family) is registered in Tanzania as an NGO no. 8059. It is administered by the The Bethany Project (Tanzania) UK (Reg. Charity no 517995),   Reg. Address: 2 Aspen Fold, Oswaldtwistle, Accrington, Lancashire. BB5 4PH.  Tel 01254 879694.  email: graham@pountain.net Trustees: Graham Pountain, David Borland OBE, Heather Jeffrey, Isabel Jones, Paul Pountain
find us on facebook
find us on facebook
As an Atheist by Mathew Parris Full article click here
Other songs on Youtube - click on the title Imella,  Prayer song (Swahili),  Out-takes (funny?),  ‘Lord I life your name on high’
Make a donation using Virgin Money Giving
If you are considering making a donation either one off or regular please click on  ‘Virgin money giving’  below:
Web pages being updated
To see all the children who are attending Bethany Primary school Click here to open the album
A multi purpose building at Bethany would be very useful. The cost would be about £25,000 for a building 9 metres by 16 metres.
Our new team is making progress with lots of issues since the departure of Daniel and Eliada (ex-manager and his wife).  New contracts have been drawn up for both home and school employees.  The Trustees have been registered and progress is being made with the land registration.  Our thanks go to our two Lawyers who have been supportive of our efforts to resolve various issues. Daniel’s and Eliada’s legacy: We believe we should be open and transparent with our supporters reporting both the good things and the bad.  With this in mind we have to inform you that Daniel is facing a ‘rape’ case and his wife a ‘kidnap’ case.  They also face a fraud case brought by the NSSF (Tanzania’s National Insurance).  Daniel and his wife have been unwilling to cooperate with the school with regard to the education of their 3 children and therefore they no longer attend the Bethany School. Several policies have been put in place to ensure that such abuses perpetrated by our ex-manager can not happen in the future.  We now have a strong team in place determined to make Bethany a safe place for all our children.
Above you will see a picture of our new Tractor which we bought with a grant of £10,000 from the Souter Charitable Trust of Perth to whom we are most grateful. Our very old Land Rover which we had for over twenty years finally died just a few days before our new tractor arrived.  We are also fortunate that Dion and Bex are visiting and Dion who is familiar with Tractors can teach our drivers how to look after it.  It will be used to help grow crops at Bethany and also to fetch firewood for the kitchen and also to help with all the building work at Bethany.
Above: Happy children waiting for a photograph
Above: Washing the traditional way
NEWS: VolunteersThis year will see several groups of volunteers visiting Bethany including, Rebecca and Dion, Pete and Kim, John Waith, Mark and Gill, Dave Shaw leading a group and of course our Treasurer David Borland. Head teacher’s house:  In February we hope to start building accommodation for our head teacher so that she can live on site to manage the school. Secondary School:  Later in the year we hope to start building our secondary school which, when completed, should have 4 classrooms, a library, a multi purpose classroom for IT work as well as an admin office, staffroom and toilet block.  However funds will only allow for the first couple of classrooms to be built.  The school will be for girls Primary School:  Emmakulatha (our head teacher) informs me there are now 217 children at our primary school nearly half of them from the Bethany home and the other half from the village.  As far as we are aware we are the only non fee paying English medium school in Tanzania.  As Christians we believe we are here to support orphans and the children from poorer families.  We do however ask parents to help provide the school uniforms as they would have to do if they attended the local government school.  Other than that we supply all the children’s needs including Breakfast and Lunch. New accommodation:  Work has been completed converting two temporary classrooms back to dormitories for Boys.  Old Clinic block: Until recently our old Clinic building had been used for temporary classrooms and storage.  Mwita has been busy upgrading two of the larger rooms to classrooms and also a toilet block for use by the teachers.  Three smaller rooms will be converted to bedrooms for male teachers. Three students for UK education: Although we had hoped that three of our older girls would come to study at Blackburn College to become teachers at the moment Blackburn College are not accepting international students.  Perhaps in the future this will change. Older Boys:  From January 2018 all boys of secondary age will no longer reside at the Bethany home.  This in part is for the safety of our girls.  Instead the boys are placed in foster care at Kitongo some 60 kilometers from Bethany and attend a local secondary school there. Further Education:  We have two students at University, one student at teacher training college and two students at high School.  Unfortunately we will no longer be in a position to support our older children past high school.  The burden of the debt incured by Bethany cannot be justified as there is little chance of them obtaining jobs or the debts being repaid.  In future, after secondary or high school we will help the children find employment if possible and they will have to save money to provide any further training or education.
Above; Children gather for Assembly
Above: Consolatha studying hard
Above: New children admitted January 2018 Back row: Thereza, Letisia, Anneth, Anna, Jacob, Esther Front row: Pendo, Debora, Jackline, Baraka, Rose
Above: New desks and benches
Above left to right:  Jesca (coordinator), Mwita (assistant coordinator)and Emmakulatha (head Teacher)
NEWS February 2018
Our next monthly meeting ( Sunday May 6th) will include a report from John Waith.  John returns from an 18 day trip to Bethany on the 5th April.  Whilst there he helped with the teaching of Maths as well as distributing educational equipment to the local village children who attend the government schools.