Projects

Uthman's Dream (UDI) is an Australian NGO which was founded in early 2019 to pursue the dream of Uthman Sudai, a former Ugandan orphan, who wishes to provide similarly orphaned children in Uganda with a 'safe environment in which they can live, laugh and learn skills that will enable them to give back to their communities.'

Uthman's community in Northern Uganda was severly impacted by the violent insurgence of the Lord's Resistance Army from the late 1980's until the first decade of this century. Thousands of children were killed or orphaned and many were abducted as child soldiers. Today of the 220,000 inhabitants in Kitgum over 68,000 are orphans.

UDI contacted AWF in mid 2020 to discuss their vision of setting up an orphanage and school in Kitgum in Northern Uganda. The brief was for the masterplanning and design of a staged campus to provide both housing and school facilities for children from kindergarten through to graduation. Key attributes are a focus on creating a homelike facility for the children, being sustainable and embedding ESD principles and using local construction methodologies and materials while creating a high quality learning environment.

AWF Network Partner Jackson Clements Burrows Architects (JCBA) took up the challenge using their significant experience in educational design to prepare a masterplan and concept design for the campus. Throughout the process they worked closely with the UDI team and AWF using participatory techniques of iterative diagramming via a series of regular workshops, until the agreed staged masterplan was resolved.

The initial masterplan and visualisation is now completed. We eagerly await the next stage of this important project as UDI obtain local costings and construction methodologies through the community in Uganda.

Year: 2021 

Status: Phase 1 (Masterplan & Concept Design) Completed

Partners: JCBA