A team of U.S. Navy Seabees began construction on the Ecole 5 school in Djibouti, June 2010. The school, which will be attended by approximately 1,200 students, is scheduled to be completed by early 2011.

"We're planning to build a 6,508 square foot building," said U.S. Navy Petty Officer First Class Joseph Waddell, Ecole 5 project supervisor. "Right now we're going to be building new columns for stability and structural integrity."

Waddell leads a team of seven sailors, working to clean up and reinforce the foundation and infrastructure of the expected school.

"The school is going to have five classrooms, two offices and two storage rooms," said Petty Officer 2nd Class Michael Moore, project crew leader. "The last couple days we've just been doing construction and ground work."

The team has also recently been working on excavation of the classrooms, cleaning out the rooms and preparing to install concrete walls with cement blocks for additional stability, Moore said. The projected completion is February 2011.

To take advantage of the training opportunity, Waddell and his team started the project June this year, with plans to finish the school in nine months.
"We should definitely be able to finish by February." Moore said.