KAILA - YADUA Village School is a five-minute walk from Denimanu Village on Yadua Island. Located by the hillside with three main classroom blocks, you'd be surprised at how classes are conducted and the minimal resources available for the children.
As privileged as we are on the mainland to go to a school with sturdy classroom buildings, sport facilities, and good sanitation and hygiene, the students of Yadua Village School have to share classrooms, fetch water from a nearby drum when visiting the tin shed where the water seal toilets are and practise on grass courts for netball and rugby.
Sure they have blackboards, desks and chairs, but all eight streams are managed and taught by three teachers.
Classes One to Three are taught by headteacher Iosefo Meke, his wife teaches Classes Four to Five while Arvina Kumar teaches the senior classes, Six to Eight. It's not easy to juggle your time between three classes in a single room and it certainly isn't a normal sight but that's how the school has worked since its establishment in 1946 because of its small class size.
Kaila! visited the school last week and met an excited bunch of students just before lunch hour. Classes One to Three were the noisiest of the lot when the camera started flashing much to their delight.
When a senior student beat the lali for lunch hour, the students made their way hastily back to the village for meal time before heading back to the school compound an hour later.
"There's an abandoned school building before our block that was damaged by Cyclone Kina almost 20 years ago," Mr Meke said.
"We've had a good pass rate and most of them go on to secondary schools in Lautoka or Vanua Levu.
"The school doesn't have electricity and if we do need electricity, my personal generator supplies the school with that.
"We get water from the borehole and the school's water tank."
Mr Meke, who was at Navakasiga District School in Bua last year, says parents pay $10 per term for each student at the school.
An empty classroom is still under renovations for the school library which teachers hope will be completed soon for the benefit and sake of the children on Yadua.