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In the Gambia with Southampton University Officer Cadet Corps

IT is a small gesture that means so much to the hundreds of children desperate to get a good education.

In the Gambian village of Soma, the youngsters have so little that even giving them an empty water bottle so they can fill it with water from the nearest well and take it to school means the earth.

So when I walked into one of the packed classrooms at Soma Lower Basic School with a huge box full of footballs and bags packed with hundreds of brand new exercise books it's no surprise I was greeted with delight.

The gifts from the Daily Echo, bought in the local market, are a drop in the ocean compared to the tons and tons of aid shipped out to this region by a team of university students from across Hampshire.

The 28 members of the Southampton University Officer Cadet Corps had spent four months gathering vital supplies that would help the poor people of this community. It was just part of their preparations for a two-week expedition, called "Exercise Gambian Sapper" to rebuild a condemned classroom block used daily by around 200 children.

But nevertheless, it now means nearly every class in the school has a ball for sports lessons and the many football matches that are played on the sandy, dusty ground that is their play area.

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The 200 exercise books have been stacked neatly inside a cabinet in the headmaster's office but will no doubt be used up within the next month and once again the supplies will run dry.

But despite this the teachers and pupils cannot thank you enough.

Members of the Southampton University Officer Cadet Corps (SUOTC) in class with the children of Fum COi Cunda School.

Their gratitude to the SUOTC team can be seen every day - with the children befriending the cadets and gathering morning and night to watch work progress on their new school building.

For many of the team, being able to go into the classes and see first hand how the education system works - surprisingly it doesn't differ too much from that in classrooms across Hampshire - has been a reward in itself.

Taking time out from the hard graft on the building site, in small groups and under the guidance of expedition leader Captain Nigel Hill they have each gone into classes both at Soma school and into other classrooms in schools tucked away deep in the Gambian bush, to teach the children.

Headmaster Dodou L F Sonko, has been at Soma's school - which has 636 boys and 653 girls on its roll - for the past two years.

Speaking about the achievements of the Hampshire expedition team, he said: "I am very much happy. The lack of accommodation has been a problem for us. Another block now has cracks in the walls and has been condemned but we are having to still use that. Once the new block is finished the children will move there.

"The classrooms that have been rebuilt by these people have been properly done. I have been to see for myself and I am so very grateful to them all. The children here are so very happy to receive this, and especially all the toys that they brought with them and handed out in the school. We never knew that this aid would also come - it was a big surprise to me."

Mr Sonko said when the school block was finished and handed over he was planning a large ceremony that all 1,300 pupils and 29 teachers including himself would be present for."

Speaking about the footballs and exercise books given by the Daily Echo he added: "I am very grateful. They are great value to us. The children cannot afford to buy exercise books so this will mean so much.

"In our physical education we end up playing many games like football. We did not have many but now, thanks to the newspaper, we will have our problems eased because before we had to find the balls from somewhere else. We are very happy about it indeed."

Director of education for the region, Madi Jatta, was so impressed with the work of the SUOTC that he hosted a special evening, including dinner, to say thank you.

Addressing the team he said he had paid a secret visit to the building site to see how work was progressing and was delighted, adding that he hoped it would not be the end of the group's links with the village of Soma.

Mr Jatta has been in overall charge of education at 53 schools in the area for the past four years - catering for a total of 14,200 children.

Speaking to me that night he said: "Soma is a big school with senior teachers who have been here for a long time. The reason we have classes the size that we do is because of the parents' enthusiasm for their children to go to school - they know that only by going to school will their children have the chance of what we call a white collar job. For the children here it is their social security - there are no other means in the Gambia. If you don't get employed you get absolutely zero."

Soma is counted as "blessed" because it also has an Upper Basic School, where children aged 13-15 can go. For those who continue their education, a 10-kilometre walk away is the senior secondary school for pupils aged 16-18, where they can study exams just short of the level required for A-levels, which are recognised by universities here in the UK.

Speaking about the rebuilding project, Mr Jatta - who himself has visited Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight and got his own qualifications in London and Bristol when he was young - said: "I am truly impressed. These people from Southampton are what I call true friends. Their intervention is what I would say a force to be reckoned with."