On the other hand, when schools receive safe water access, it can be a blessing for communities. H2O4ALL frequently partners with schools to reach the most vulnerable people in any water-stressed community – the children – and to help schools support the community’s next generation. By empowering young people, we can give them the tools they need to change the world around them. 

Over the past two years, several schools have partnered with H2O4ALL to provide safe water for their students and their community. In 2020, H2O4ALL traveled to Mawotto, Uganda, to implement a safe water source at Tom and Margaret Education Center. At this time, children were making up to three trips a day to collect water for their school and their families. The safe water project at Tom and Margaret, as well as the food sustainability project that followed it, empowered the school to provide for their students and ensure that the community’s children grow up healthy.

In 2022, two schools in small Kenyan communities partnered with H2O4ALL to receive safe water systems. In Spring of 2022, Ntalami Primary School in Ntalami, Meru County, Kenya received a safe water source. At the time, students and staff brought their own water to school each morning. In the evening, children had to go out again to collect more water for their households. Since the implementation of the school’s new water system, however, the school not only has enough water to provide for staff, students, and their families, but the surrounding community benefits as well. In the September of the same year, another safe water system was implemented in Kiangini Secondary School in Kitui County, Kenya. With a safe water system at their school, Kiangini’s young people can finally attend school regularly, receive a full education, and build brighter futures for themselves and their families.

More recently, we partnered with our old friends from Reach One Touch One Ministries to implement a safe water system at Life Primary and Secondary Schools in Kyempene, Uganda. In 2023, the schools received a 7,000-litre safe water system, providing abundant safe water for students and staff. Through water access, we can help keep children in school and support them on their journey to a bright future.

As we move into the new year, our work empowering the next generation isn’t finished. Our work in 2025 begins at St. Edward Special School in Awendo, Kenya, where the Ken Brock Memorial Project is underway. The school’s water system will provide for more than 600 staff and students at the school, along with 2,600 people in the Awendo community and 8,000 in the surrounding area. The project will honor Ken Brock, an H2O4ALL board member, lawyer, and advocate for education who passed away last October. 

In addition to our work empowering young people with water-stressed communities, we strive to tap into the talents and dedication of the next generation here in Canada. In February, we’re working with a team of students from the University of Waterloo, Canada to extend our ongoing filter project in the Dominican Republic. 

Since our partnership with Wine to Water began in 2014, volunteers have helped us bring safe water to nearly a quarter of a million people in struggling communities throughout the Dominican Republic. On each volunteer trip, volunteers assist with filter construction in Wine to Water’s filter factory, distribute dozens of filters to families in need, and work with the community to educate filter recipients about filter maintenance and water safety. 

The volunteer team was organized by Chris Houser, the Dean of Faculty of Science at the University of Waterloo. A veteran of the volunteer project, Professor Houser previously worked with Wine to Water student organizations at Windsor University and Texas A & M University. This year’s trip, which includes eight students from the engineering department, will be the University of Waterloo’s first volunteer trip with Wine to Water.

“My hope for the project is to inspire our students to service.” he says of the upcoming trip. “Wine to Water trips bring volunteers closer to understanding how to translate their science into something that has an impact. How can I use my science in support of others?”