Manivovo Rural Training Centre
Makira Province

We have six staff members and a student capacity of 50. It is one of three girls-only RTCs belonging to SIARTC, accepting female students of all denominations from the age of 18 and under 26, who have left the formal school system. It is our mission to shape these young women to become good mothers and pro-active women in their society, Women graduating from our centre have the life skills and confidence to contribute in their own way in the male dominated culture of Solomon Islands, as well as to help develop the forgotten and under-developed province of Makira. and we are proud of our centre that has already survived 15 years amidst real rural subsistence conditions.
As part of our normal vocational programme, the students farm the land, producing vegetables, rice and beef. Our centre's location on the cool and rainy south coast of Makira also allows us to grow bananas, swamp taro, and rice. We keep cattle, pigs and chickens, and keep fish in 5 x 20 x 25 m ponds. In addition to our vocational programme, we also have sports, such as karate for the girls, and dancing and music.To help centre finances and train the students, we have a trade store, serving the communities of this area.
The old buildings of the former Catholic Mission are still used. There are two classrooms, a workshop, dormitory, kitchen, dining hall, chapel, and six staff houses. There is a generator for light, and we have two radios. Sanitation and water are good. We have a paddle canoe and outboard motor for transport.
Manivovo began as a primary education resource centre (1976), offering Literacy programmes by 1986, and later functioned as a Catholic Mission (1991). Increasing needs for better education, led to Manivovo broadening its horizons. The centre became a Full Member SIARTC in 1996.