Twitti Primary School in the community of Lilayi, Zambia

When Lydia and Simon Maonde,Zambian teachers, retired from their long careers in education, they took up a new life as farmers in the Lilayi community near Lusaka, Zambia’s capital.  The need for a school for the children of the farm workers was apparent and so, in 1994, Mrs. Maonde began to teach 5 pre-schoolers in the Maonde home. Word spread in the community of how well these children were being taught, and parents soon brought others to learn. Since the 3 Maonde sons and 1 daughter had grown and moved away, their small bedrooms became the school classrooms. 

By 2005 there were about 200 children coming, in morning and afternoon shifts, to be pupils at this new Twitti School. The name Twitti was chosen since the word ‘twitti’ means the smallest twig, a symbol for these tiny children who were becoming part of the powerful tree of education. When this ‘school in the house’ was reaching its physical limits, an amazing re-connection occurred. Mr. and Mrs. Maonde, by means of the Internet, began to correspond with three Canadians who had worked with them at Namwala Secondary School in Southern Province more than thirty-five years earlier. Mr. Maonde requested their help in financing the construction of a ‘real’ school. 

Former CUSO volunteer teachers, Patrick and Shelley O' Callaghan in British Columbia, and Patricia (Brown) Ellsworth in New Brunswick, committed to their former Headmaster and his wife to help them build a school, an enduring legacy for the Lilayi community.  In 2006, Friends for Zambia Society was established and fund raising began. In 2009, the first 4 classrooms were constructed and each year more facilities were added until 2012 when Twitti Primary School was completed.