Fourth grade students in Jennifer Boyce’s classroom at South Point Elementary have been learning about the Tanzania Water Fund, which aims to bring clean water to the villages of rural Tanzania by engaging local communities to build wells that bring water resources closer to home.
Tanzania is a country in East Africa known for its vast wilderness areas. It’s one of the poorest countries in the world.
The fourth grade recently read an article called "Two Miles for a Drink of Water," and learned about how so many people in Tanzania and other parts of the world do not have access to clean water, even in 2024.
“We saw pictures of the water they were drinking and the kids were shocked that it was brown,” Boyce said.
More than 41 million people live in rural Tanzania. As of 2022, 55 people of people do not have access to clean water. That is more than 22 million. Across the country, locals spend hours each day walking miles to collect mere buckets of water for household tasks. The net impact of systems like these can be a poverty cycle of lost time and resources for health, education, and economic opportunity.
The fourth grade students have been working on a water filtration project where they try to find the best filter for creek water and would they be willing to drink it. They did not drink the creek water for the project.
For the project, South Point Elementary Library Media Specialist Michelle Prewitt collected jugs of creek water. The students had a few different options of things they could use to filter the water, including coffee filters and cheesecloths, to see how comfortable they were with drinking it.
“We just wanted to show the students how some people do not have it as easy as we do with something so basic as clean water,” Boyce said.
Additionally, the students had an opportunity to be on a zoom call with Justin Futrell, who works for the Tanzania Water Fund and recently traveled home from Tanzania.
Photos of South Point Elementary students examining the creek water are below.
