South Sudan
Atepi Nursery & Primary – Pajok Centre
Where TEP began: nursery and lower primary for children who had never stepped into a classroom.
TEP
TEP
Atepi joins two Acholi words – ate, "let me take", and pi, "water". Like the river that flows from the Acholi hills to the Nile, the school was taken to children growing up in hiding during the civil war, who had no other way to learn. The motto is "The Lord Is My Foundation".
South Sudan
Where TEP began: nursery and lower primary for children who had never stepped into a classroom.
South Sudan
Upper primary on 24 hectares, reopened in 2024 after conflict forced it to close.
Uganda
TEP's largest school, serving refugee and host-community children – ranked 6th of 90+ schools in Lamwo.
TEP began in Pajok, South Sudan, during the long civil war, when children were growing up in hiding with no school to go to. Atepi Nursery opened there in 2005 and Pajok Odwele followed in 2015.
When fighting returned in 2017, many of our families fled across the border into Uganda. We did not leave them: we opened Atepi Primary School in the Palabek Refugee Settlement, Lamwo District. The camps have since become settled villages with little infrastructure, and Palabek is now our largest school.
In 2024 the Pajok Odwele campus reopened, and in 2025 new classroom blocks opened at Palabek and Pajok. Our schools are open to every child, whatever their tribe or religion.
