The 2000-2001 Cosmopolitan Club Service Award was presented to Lishomwa Mulongwe, a graduate student from Zambia who studied Forestry at the University of Illinois and was a resident of the Cosmopolitan Club for one and a half years. The school, which has about 200 children in seven different grades, educates children of farm workers in a commercial farming area. If they don't get educated, it's practically impossible to get out of the trap. The government does what it can to promote education, but funds are low and the number of public school teachers has been reduced.
Books are expensive and limited, and children often have to share.
Teachers in Mazabuka care about their students. Many spend extra time after school helping children who are falling behind. They also try to send books home with the children so that they can practice reading at home. To do more of this, teachers need more books. Thanks to Mulongwe and to his Cosmo friends and to various individuals and local bookstores, the school now has more of the books they need.