Blog
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Decision time
So now comes the hard part. Deciding who to work with. I’ve seen 4 very different and interesting NGOs who are all doing amazing work to help children go to school in Zambia.
Trust is key
The LearnAsOne model is to work closely with a partner NGO to spend any money you are kind enough to give. This obviously needs to be done effectively and efficiently.
One of the key (and most expensive) needs of basic schools is construction: of classrooms, boreholes, sanitation blocks and teacher’s houses. Whilst talking with the 4 different NGOs I’ve asked for the costs to build a classroom block, all using the same official government plans. Rather alarmingly the costs have varied significantly with the most expensive being nearly 100% more than the cheapest.
Now in some cases the community are expected to provide skilled builders (as part of their contribution) and in others contractors are used. But even if these labour costs are excluded there is still a noticeable difference in price for no obvious reason. I’ve also been lucky enough to meet an ex-pat builder who is helping to fund a school close to where he lives and I’ve been able to compare his prices with the NGOs to give me a further benchmark. It’s safe to say we’ll be choosing one of the NGOs who are happy to offer costing transparency and prices we trust.
Community involvement and sustainability
All four NGOs I met were very keen to tell me about the community contribution to the project, which is fantastic to hear as schools only have a chance of success if communities want them in the first place. There is no better way to prove this than by volunteering time and material resources during the construction process.
In all cases the community is expected to provide free unskilled labour, plus locally sourced sand and stones which they make into bricks. A skilled builder is also required who must be approved by a Buildings Officer from the Ministry of Education. In some cases the community is expected to provide the the skilled labour and in others a contractor is used.
If a community is happy to provide a skilled builder themselves then this shows a total commitment to the project. It also saves a significant amount of cost.
Type of projects
As mentioned through out the blog post I’ve seen all sorts of schools this week. From town schools to rural schools. Basic schools to half built schools and High Schools. The need is great in all areas but we’ve decided that we would like to start by helping to tackle the Millennium Development Goal of providing free basic education to all children from grades 1-7.
We also want to work with a very basic community who are at the very beginning of their education journey. One key thing I’ve learnt this week is that there are two types of schools. Government and community. Trained teacher’s are supplied for free to government schools only. But it is possibly for a community school to become recognised by the government. It’s done on a case-by-case basis but some of the key criteria are that a basic classroom and a teacher’s house must be present. If we can help to get a community to this stage then there are very obvious benefits regarding the quality of teaching.
The updates
The final key part of the LearnAsOne concept is providing you with regular updates and stories from the community so you can meet some of the people who your donations are helping and see exactly what your money is being spent on.
It only makes sense for teams from LearnAsOne to visit Zambia a few times each year so part of this responsibility needs to fall on the NGO. There are two key criteria. Effectiveness of communication and the quality of updates.
Now it’s hard to make a judgement on the quality. All the NGOs showed me photographs from the field, of varying standards, and non really used a video camera. But this can be trained.
Effectiveness is much easier to see. I’ve been planning this trip for many months and the responsiveness of the NGOs to questions over email has varied enormously. One NGO has also been happy to text and voice chat on Skype making communication extremely simple and effective.
So the decision
I’ve avoided naming any names up until now. The good news is that one of the organisations ticks all the key boxes and I feel we also have a strong back-up should there be any problems or we want to expand in future.
The NGO we’ve decided to go with is Response Network.
They work with very communities who have very basic schools, are very easy to communicate with and their entire model is based around self-help and community empowerment. They are also the only organisation who insist on the community providing the skilled labour. I was initially sceptical about this, but I’ve learnt that the builder must be approved by the Ministry of Education before any work takes place. This approach shows a total commitment to the school by the community and maximises it’s chance of success.
So all that awaits now if for Adam, Brenda and Nerys to join me. Then on Monday morning we’ll be heading up to Kalomo to start documenting our first project live!
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Site update: Totaliser for the first school now live!
Hello everybody.
First of all thank you for your patience with the downtime over the weekend. We were upgrading the site with lots of help from Volunteer Bill. Everything seems to have gone well, but if you notice any problems or broken links please leave a comment below so we can get it fixed. Thank you.
Visually, there has been one major change to the site. A totaliser has been added to the homepage so that you can see the fundraising progress for the first school.
How much will the school cost?
The target has been set at £25,000. At this stage we can’t promise this is 100% accurate, but what can say with certainty is the first school will cost no more than this. And that any extra money raised will go towards a second community school.
We will provide a final target live from our trip to Zambia this May once we have sat down with the community and discussed exactly what they need. A full breakdown of costs will also be provided so you can see exactly what any money you are kind enough to donate will be spent on.
Follow the trip
You can follow the trip live by subscribing to this blog or using twitter.
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First Trip Date: May ‘09
Exciting news. I can today announce that the first trip to Zambia will be this May!
I recently spoke with Vanessa Parker who founded the Tongabezi Trust School near Livingstone. She was kind enough to share the official holidays for schools across Zambia, which are as as follows:
Term 1: 10 April to 10 May 2009
Term 2: 07 August to 06 September 2009
Term 3: 4 December 2009 to 10 January 2010.So we are are going schedule the trip from 11 May onwards, as soon as term 1 holidays are over. More to follow as we have it.
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Plans for the first trip to Zambia
Just a short post today to point you in the direction of the plans for the first trip. This link should give you a good insight into what needs to be done both before and during our time in Zambia.
The key pre-trip activity is researching NGOs (non-govermental organisations) who we could partner with to run the schools on the ground. This will be narrowed down to a top two or three organisations who we will meet on the trip.
Once we’ve found one we click with (shared values, similar ways of working etc.) we’ll set up a relationship and together we will establish the first LearnAsOne community school project.
I’ll keep you updated on the research via this blog and twitter. Please feel free to leave any questions or suggest NGOs in the comments.
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Does aid to Africa really work?
My dad recently pointed me in the direction of Addicted to Aid, a Panorama programme featuring award-winning Sierra Leonean reporter Sorious Samura.
The basic question he asked was has the West got it’s aid model wrong? Billions of pounds have been pumped into Africa yet the number of poor people remains unchanged over the last 20 years. Has too little attention been paid to where the aid ends up?
Corruption, waste and inefficiency
Through a number of case studies he highlighted corruption, aid money being spent on the wrong things (e.g. building new schools in Uganda when what was really needed was to pay teachers to man them) and shops selling stolen aid supplies such as mosquito nets which were intended to be given to the local community for free, while the authorities turned a blind eye.
Hope
The final project however offered hope. A clinic set up to help amputees as a result of the bloody civil war in Sierra Leone. It was founded and is run by Dr. Mohammed Barrie who grew up in Kroo Bay, one of the poorest parts of the capital city Freetown. And it has proved to be amazingly successful with patients travelling from as far away as the neighbouring country Guinea.
Why has this project been such a success?
Well in the words of Dr. Barrie:
“We went straight to the community, we interacted with them, we tried to understand their basic needs and as a result they were very supportive in developing this project.”
One other thing really stuck out. Whenever Dr. Barrie got a cheque to support the clinic he photocopied it and make it easily accessible to his patients. They knew what money was coming in, so they could judge if he was spending it wisely.
What can we learn from this?
2 main things:
1) Listening to the local community is vital
They, and only they, know what challenges they face and where their needs lie.So if you want to improve the standard of education in a community do you just build more classrooms? Or do sit down with the community and discuss their most pressing needs? Maybe the teachers in rural schools are leaving because the living conditions are really poor compared to the city. Or the children are failing to turn up to class because they need to work all day to buy food.
Both problems can be addressed, by building basic living quarters and through a school feeding program respectively. But these needs can only be successfully tackled by working alongside the community to identify these needs in the first place. And it goes without saying, that every community will be different.
2) Transparency is a must
Both between us and you as potential or current supporters. And the community, ourselves and our partners in Africa who manage the project on a day-to-day basis. It’s your money and you deserve to see how it is spent.That’s why we are blogging and twittering about the behind the scenes stuff rather than just sticking a school in front of you and asking for money. When we get to Africa we’ll shoot videos, photos and interviews with the community and try to answer the questions you ask. And we’ll ensure there is a way for the updates to keep coming once we’re back home.
So does aid to Africa really work? We’ll let you be the judge of that.
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Second meeting with the Zambian High Commissioner
Just before Christmas I had a second meeting with the Zambian High Commissioner, Mr. Anderson Chibwa. He introduced me to a former colleague of his, called Njekwa, who works for a large multi-national NGO in Zambia and has specialist knowledge of the education sector.Establishing an NGO partner
After showing Njekwa a prototype of the new website (about 90% complete) we had a brief discussion about our aims and initial plans. A key aspect of this was our wish to find an established NGO partner in Zambia who has the capacity to build not one, but numerous schools. The thinking being that we can use our learning from the first school to build many other schools in the region. At least, that’s the theory!
Njekwa kindly offered to support us by using her local knowledge to research and shortlist a number of potentially suitable NGO partners, who we can then contact and visit on our initial trip. And from this we can select a partner to work with.
Numerous other things were discussed including how the relationship with the NGO and local community may work, through to issues we may face on the ground and very rough costings. Njekwa also suggested that we visit at least one well run community based school whilst on our trip to use both as a benchmark and to help establish best practice. A great idea! And one we defiantly hope to follow up if at all possible.
So the next steps are for Njekwa to carry out her exploratory research and then discuss and follow up what she comes back with.
Your ideas
Should you have any suggestion for a potential NGO partners, or anything else you thing may be useful, then we’d love to here it. Please add a comment or send an email to hello at learnasone dot org.
The initial requirements are:
- A local NGO specialising in education and located in Zambia
- Capacity to build numerous schools in one region
Thanks. More to follow as soon as we have it.
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A long overdue update (including notes from a meeting with the Zambian High Commissioner)
Hello all,
Firstly, sorry for the ridiculous length of time since the last update. You’ll be glad to know that all is still going well at LearnAsOne and that updates will be considerably more frequent from now on!
So what’s been happening?
Well three main things:
1) Developing the website (which is about 85% complete).
2) Gearing up for the first visit to Africa to select the first school.
3) Some small scale fundraising.I’ll briefly bring you up to speed.
Developing the website
The website is being developed so that you can donate to a specific community in need of a school.
Every school will get their own web page featuring a fundraising target, a shopping list of what they need and a way for you to donate. Plus a blog to provide regular feedback (video, written, photos etc.) so you can see exactly how your money is being spent. You will also be able to leave questions for the kids, teachers and community members to answer. Think of it as a cross between Facebook and JustGiving.
The new site is still in development but is now about 85% complete. Key screenshots can be found here - http://www.flickr.com/photos/7370765@N05/sets/72157603655096088. All the web development is being done on a voluntary basis by two amazing individuals, Ian Pearce and Bill Glover. This has resulted in a significant cost saving, which means that more of your money can go towards the first school. But on the flip side it means it’s taking longer than we initially hoped to get the new site live.
I can however tell you that the new site is shaping up really well and will be worth the wait! It’s currently restricted to the developers and a few testers. But as the development gets closer to completion we will be looking for more testers to provide feedback before the full launch. Look out for more details on how to become a tester appearing on this blog in the near future.
Selecting the first school
The most interesting and important part of this update of course surrounds the first school, which will be in Zambia.
Yesterday I had the pleasure of spending just over an hour in the company of the Zambian High Commissioner, Mr. Anderson Chibwa. I was able to introduce LearnAsOne, show him the current prototype for the new site and discuss the opportunities to work in Zambia. He offered to make a number of calls on our behalf, put us directly in touch with potential partners (local NGOs who specialise in education) and make introductions to other individuals in the media and at the Ministry of Education.
The next step will be to follow up on these contacts, and set up an exploratory trip to meet these people and identify our first NGO partner. And from there select the first community to work, establish their educational needs, set up their web page on the new site and get into full scale fundraising for the first school.
The one word of caution was the upcoming rainy season (Dec-April) which can make travel difficult. We are still looking into options for visiting during this period as it looks like this is when the initial funding will be sufficient to justify the trip and the new website will be up and running.
Again, you will be kept posted as to how things develop.
And a brief fundraising update
Despite a period of inactivity on the site, small scale fundraising has been continuing.
Dugald Wilson decided run the Edinburgh marathon in aid of LearnAsOne and raised £344 in the process. The New Bucks University Student Union continued their fine work from early in the year and sent through a cheque for £528. And our trustee Iain Gray raised £595 in sponsorship by completing l’Etape - the hardest stage of the Tour de France. There have been a number general donations too.
I’d like to take this opportunity to say a big thank you to everyone who has contributed their time and money over the past few months. It’s fantastic to see money coming in even before the first school project is up on the site.
Thanks everyone!
P.S. If you would like to take part in an event to raise money for LearnAsOne it’s simple to set-up a fundraising page. Just use this link and follow the simple instructions.