Maavah council to place ACs in all classrooms

Laamu atoll Maavah Council has announced that it will be placing air conditioners in all the classrooms of the island's school through its budget.

Maavah School has over 400 students enrolled, studying from Grades 1 to 10.

Maavah Council Member Salma Abdul Raheem told Mihaaru News that placing air conditioners in all the classrooms is an initiative being taken by the council.

"Students are in uncomfortably hot classrooms here in school. To find a solution for this, we believed the council can do something that the residents want, and place ACs in all the classrooms," he said.

"Council's budget is not that extensive. Hence, at the time we decided if we do not have to spend on it, and instead the government does, then we can allocate those funds to other social initiatives."

The government has also previously announced the 'Cool School' project through which they aim to air condition all classrooms.

Salman said that the council had come to the decision to place ACs themselves as they did not expect the island's school to be fixed with ACs any time in the near future under the government's project.

Salman said that the council is now undertaking preparations for the project. The council plans to fix air conditioners in the twelve existing classrooms in the single session school, as well as in nine extra classrooms that are being built.

With total 35 air conditioners needed, each class will be equipped with two 18 BTU units.

Salman said that in addition to the school and council, social NGOs and Fenaka will also assist in placing air conditioners.

Initially, the council set the budget for the project at MVR 200,000. However, as this would not be enough to complete the entire project, coverage of the remaining expenses have also now been approved by the council. With this, MVR 300,000 is expected to be spent.

Salman said that they have obtained authorization from the Ministry of Education to carry out the project. He said that currently they are working on procuring the ACs through a bidding process. He expects the fixing of ACs to be completed before the end of the year.