Our Story

The Uphill Trust is a small Scottish charity founded in January 2015 to support the development of Uphill Junior School. Trust Chairman Niall ‘Max’ Macdonald got to know the founders of the school whilst rediscovering his roots in western Uganda.

Max visited the fledgling school in October 2013 and was inspired by the children he met there. He was also impressed by the vision of the School Director Elius and his struggle to develop an educational facility on a small plot of rented land with very little funding. He resolved to do ‘something’, thinking that he might be able to find enough money to provide corrugated iron sheets for the roofless classrooms…

THE UPHILL STORY

2023
The walls are up!

The new Uphill hall with kitchen is progressing! The walls are up, the roof is on and the plastering has been completed inside and out. Read more about this project here.
Walls are up!

Eco Stoves in the new School Kitchen

Find out why we decided to fit environmentally friendly Eco-Stoves in the new school kitchen…

eco stoves at uphill junior school

A New Home for the Uphill Teachers

In February 2022 we were given the opportunity to buy a house with land. This would become the Uphill Staff Accommodation compound. After a year of fundraising the house renovation were complete and 9 teachers moved in.

new home for uphill teachers

School Hall in Use!

After a long, drawn out build, the new multipurpose school hall is finally in use as a dining hall, for assemblies and parent meetings, and as a performance space.

pupils in the new dining hall

2024
More Homes For Teachers

With help from a generous grant, four more teacher homes plus a permanent kitchen were added to the staff compound. The new terrace was officially opened in March 2024 and more staff have moved in! We are now building a bespoke sanitation block for this site and will be installing security fencing once that is completed.

More homes for Uphill teachers

School Registration

After ticking many boxes and jumping through some last minute hoops we are delighted to announce Uphill Junior School is now a fully registered Ugandan private educational institution! Headteacher Michael and Director Elius are rightly very pleased with the accreditation, which has been a long time coming.

Uphill Junior School is now registered

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