Chipembis Girls School was founded in 1926 by Revered Douglas Gray (in photo above) of the Methodist Church and it became the first girls boarding school in Zambia. Douglas worked to fulfil his dream of liberating women and girls from ignorance, superstition and disease. Writing about their need he said:- Young girls endured tribal initiation ceremonies (chisungu). One recognises that there is some good in most of the native customs, and even this one of which we are writing is no exception. The girls learn something of the duties of married life, wholesome lessons for the future. It has been truly said that as no stream can rise higher than its source, so no people can rise higher than the level of their women. It is they who are the repositories of the teaching of the tribe, and upholders of the old traditions and customs.” Having seen on his journeys, as a missionary in Chipembi, the condition of women and girls in the villages, he realised that the time had come for a more radical approach to girls’ education and decided to start a girls’ boarding school at Chipembi. It is delightful to note that after its founding, the school went on to become Zambia’s premier educational establishment for girls. Its alumni were the first to go to universities in the then Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and Britain, returning to take their places as key figures in the newly independent Zambia. To date (2024), the school is still ranked as one of the best girls’ school in the Republic of Zambia, the legacy we shall endeavour to uphold.