Trish Clark

A School For Phoujong Trish Clark

A School For Phoujong tells the story of how a couple of veteran Australian journalists developed a project to build a new primary school for a remote and severely impoverished village in northern Laos. Phoujong Village has a population of about 300 mainly ethnic Yao and Hmong people. It has no electricity, just a rudimentary water supply and only primitive sewage facilities. The houses are mainly earthern-floored, with an open-hearth fire in the middle and the village had just one dilapidated hut used as a schoolfor more than thirty children aged from five to twelve, with only one teacher. Its an inspirational story abouthow the new school was funded and then built...over a period of just on eight weeks in early 2015, with several heart-warming consequences, including a new walking aid for a young student crippled by polio and a joint children's art exhibition with Chillingham Primary School in northern New South Wales.