Canary Wharf Collection – 11th November 2015

Can you help us raise funds at Canary Wharf on Wednesday 11^th November?

We found out this month that we’ve been given a slot at Canary Wharf Tube Station for a collection! This is by far the collection highlight of the year for us – last year, we raised £1,000 during one day’s collecting at Canary Wharf – and we’d absolutely love to do that again this year, but we can’t do it without you!

We are looking for passionate, motivated and enthusiastic individuals to help fill slots between 06.30 am and 10 pm on 11th November, and we’ll be there with t-shirts, buckets, tins, stickers, signs, (you name it!) so we really stand out and grab everyone’s attention.

This is a great opportunity to be part of a fantastic and exciting community fundraising campaign contributing to vital education work. Please let us know if you or anyone you know can help – and thank you so much to everyone that has helped with our collections so far this year, you’re amazing!

Together, we can absolutely blitz this collection and raised a huge sum to support African Revival’s work in Uganda and Zambia 🙂

Interested? Get in touch with Emily on 020 8939 3190 or send an e-mail to emily.brewster@africanrevival.org

A Gallery of Photos and Stories: Celebrating School Demonstration Gardens in Amuru District

Recently, our Livelihood team was joined by Mette Müller Kristensen, a representative of the Besteller Foundation. For two days, they set out together to assess the project and hear the stories of SDG participants – but above all to celebrate the progress of our School Demonstration Gardens! Find out more with our gallery of photos, inspiring speeches, quotes and comments! Click on here to see it!

Here are a few sneak peeks:

At Lujuro Primary School, the SDG group, called Lujuro Farmer Group, took the celebration up to another level, cheering with great joy and enthusiastically performing a bunch of traditional Acholi songs and dances.

The Lujuro P/S Pupils Entrepreneurship Club prepared some traditional songs too. One of them is about teamwork, as they sing:

“We work together, and it’s easier!”

This philosophy was put into practice when pupils helped parents to transplant the onions from the nursery bed. The work was completed quicker, and the parents will show their gratitude for the pupils’ help by sharing the profits with them. 

Inspired by the song, Mette, Bestseller Representative, added the African proverb:

“If you want to walk fast walk alone.
And if you want to walk far, walk together!”

And indeed, in the end, SDG is all about working together to ensure equal access to quality education, so that when the next generation walk hand in hand, they can go even further!

Happy World Food Day!

‘Either we build a future for all, or there will be no acceptable future for anyone:
Let’s be the Zero Hunger Generation!’

– is one of the messages of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations. and through our School Demonstration Garden Project, we are working towards this goal too! Currently, we implemented the project under the name LEARN in Agago and Abim in cooperation with SVN and in Amuru thanks to the support of the Bestseller Fundation. And, we have just secured a multi-years grant to implement the SDG in Zambia!

What do we do?

We set up farmer groups comprising of up to 50 parents who work at the school on the demonstration garden, attend weekly meetings and receive practical training by AR field staff. Our field staff support them in every step of the way from the preparation of the land to the marketing of their produce and finally, they also receive training in saving techniques and financial management to ensure their financial stability. After selling their produce, 30% of the harvest profits is saved for the next season, 40% is distributed among parents and the school receives 30%. Previously, these profits were then used to provide school meals, subsidise fees for poorest pupils or provide scholastic materials. Furthermore, pupils entrepreneurship clubs are formed too, in order to ensure the next generation are acquiring valuable skills.

Why?

Agriculture continues to play a critical role – i.e. in the Ugandan economy, employing 82% of the national workforce. Low yields and inefficient agricultural practices leave households vulnerable. As a result, children also often go hungry while at school, a major factor as to why Uganda has the highest school dropout rate in East Africa. Additionally, this affects concentration levels and learning retention. Therefore, this project ties education and livelihoods together, and is one of African Revival’s core areas of expertise as our intervention seeks to address two interlinked issues – low quality education at a primary level and food insecurity compounded by poor agricultural productivity. We aim to create stronger links between parents and schools leading to increased enrolment, attendance and academic attainment, and children are also learning practical agricultural skills. Parents and pupils increase agricultural productivity both at the school garden and home gardens, both increasing food security and nutrition. In the end, we want to empower these communities to lift themselves out of poverty!

To celebrate the World Food Day we’ve prepared a few of our recent gathered reflections of our beneficiaries, some photos of the new agricultural techniques implemented in the school and some ‘do it yourself’ tips for all growers out there from our agriculture team.

As we aim to strengthen a strong sense of community throughout the project, parents, pupils and teachers are working hand in hand to secure a hunger-free future in which every child is nourished well, and able to thrive in his/her education/at school.

Happy World Food Day!

World Teachers’ Day – Celebrations Ugandan style!

On the 5^th of October every year, World Teachers’ Day is held to honour the hard work and dedication of teachers all across the globe. And Anaka, a town in the Nwoya district of Northern Uganda, wasn’t about to miss out on the celebrations! This year, the town council organised an awards ceremony to allow the local community to celebrate the achievements of its teachers, while also raising awareness of the vital contribution that teachers make to education and development. During the ceremony, the resident district commissioner presented awards to certain teachers who had exhibited excellent teaching performance. Prizes included a bike and a mattress – practicality always comes first in Uganda!

African Revival’s Early Childhood Development (ECD) Programme Officer, Maxwell Kinyera, attended the celebrations and interviewed some of the teachers themselves, whose commitment to their role is the backbone of the nation’s education system. Read Maxwell’s interviews below, in which the teachers reveal how they celebrated World Teachers’ Day and what they hope for their pupils and school in the future, and offer some words of advice for Newly Qualified Teachers all over the world!

Florence, aged 33, is a teacher at St. Luke Primary School in Nwoya district. To celebrate world teachers’ day, she prepared her children to present a poem. In the future, she wants her pupils to become responsible members of the community they live in, while she wants her school to be a centre for academic excellence. Florence has undergone two teacher trainings; refresher training on learning aids development and training on child protection. She believes teachers’ training should focus on developing teachers holistically so that the teachers should be able to produce children who are all rounded citizens. She welcomed and encouraged teachers out there who have just finished college to join the profession with all their heart even if the pay is small.

To celebrate World Teachers’ Day, Omona, a teacher at Anaka P.7 School, prepared her pupils to present welcome songs and dances to entertain the guests. In the future, she wants these pupils to have better lives through good jobs. In order to achieve this, she hopes for better classrooms and academic performance in her school. Omona received two trainings organised by African Revival. She added that the training helped her to develop a growth mind-set and become a better teacher. According to her thinking, teachers’ training should focus on academic and adolescent sexual reproductive health and rights. To encourage other teachers across the world who have just finished training, she said they should have positive attitude towards teaching. She appealed to them to prepare fully.

Mr. Patel is the Head-teacher of Purongo Hill Primary School, who was voted the best head teacher in the district (and as a prize received a bike – which he can be seen riding in the photo!). He contributed money towards the World Teachers’ Day celebration and he was among the organising committee for the district level celebration. Mr Patel holds a diploma in primary education and several on-job trainings related to his functions. He thinks teachers’ training should focus on attitude change and curriculum delivery, and encourages newly qualified teachers to love their profession and be committed teachers. He added that through hard work they can make them stand out from the crowd and be recognized by others. When teaching, Mr Patel enjoys being orderly and giving facts and career guidance to the learners. In the future, he wants his pupils to work hard to become better members of the society, taking up leadership positions and even replacing them in the teaching profession. He wants his school to be the best, and a model school where people and other schools come to learn from.

Interviews and photos by Maxwell Kinyera, Early Childhood Development (ECD) Programme Officer at African Revival.