We woke to bad news on the Friday before the mid-term break.

Thieves had broken into the school office during the night (they had forced two security doors) and then had forced open the school’s safe and had stolen the small safe inside containing all the fees and fares we had received during the week.

In total, the thieves stole ZMW 32,000 (that’s £1,000) – which is the equivalent of one teacher’s annual salary.

This was a deeply shocking and traumatising experience for all our staff. The funds are unrecoverable, but we also have the costs of repairing the two security doors and the door of our large safe.

We are also thoroughly revising all our cash handling procedures.

We’ve also had to buy the new safe for our cash in the photo, and are investigating much stronger security doors. It’s been a difficult (and expensive) few days…