Mobile mapping & global goals: What’s in it for Liberian youth?

August 12, 2016

By Rachel Azafrani

4 min read

For the first time in the memory of my generation, youth have been actively included in the implementation of the United Nations’ agenda for world prosperity. Through networks like Sustainable Development Solutions Network-Youth, people in that age group now interface with global leaders.

But these connections rely on resources, access and knowledge about the global development agenda—things many young people lack.

For example, in Liberia—where I surveyed young people about the Global Goals—youth volunteer their time to enhance their communities and work and learn for peace, but they do not reference their work in terms of lofty global frameworks. Less than 5 percent of the nearly 200 young Liberians I met were aware of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs or Global Goals) or Liberia’s own Agenda for Transformation, and fewer were aware that those frameworks included youth.

Mobilizing young people to act on their critical position requires a new forum that connects them to the Global Goals and puts them in the lead. If not, countries risk further excluding youth and falling short of the SDGs.

Through increasingly ubiquitous mobile infrastructure, governments and global development organizations are informing their constituents about the Global Goals. They are mobilizing youth action with tools like Creative Associates International’s SDG Youth Action Mapper—a mobile app and online mapping tool allowing users to map, make, and measure progress towards the Global Goals.

The SDG Youth Action Mapper

Interviewing youth organizations, government ministries and UN country offices in Monrovia, I investigated how the SDG Youth Action Mapper could support both young people in their endeavors and the communities in which they live.

The app allows young people to find action opportunities on the SDGs around them, from supporting education to enhancing sustainable consumption, and map their own opportunities for others to see. It collects data on the details of projects, like the names and locations of organizations working on Global Goal-relevant projects, and how such work contributes to the SDGs.

During trainings at the University of Liberia, the YMCA and the Youth Crime Watch, I gathered feedback on functionalities of the SDG Youth Action Mapper app from people and community leaders ages 14 to 34. Their responses highlighted how access to leaders and skill-building opportunities would make the app stand out in a sea of Facebooks and Instagrams, and mobilize them to act to improve their communities.

Keeping decision-makers accountable

Information about the SDGs is not widely available in Liberia. However, new organizations like the Sustainable Development Network-Liberia are cropping up to close the knowledge gap, and the SDG Youth Action Mapper could accelerate that progress.

In a climate where development and youth-focused projects come and go, SDG initiatives must create a clear interface between youth and decision-makers to gain legitimacy. Initiatives like the SDG Youth Action Mapper have the potential to become tools for accountability by increasing the visibility of youth initiatives, and could mobilize “social networks” around SDG action as users share opportunities and communicate with each other.

Young people already devise entrepreneurial community-based solutions from health to the environment, and they want these solutions to affect great change. In order for their ideas to be acted upon and scaled up, robust data about their activities must be collected and escalated to decision-makers.

As governments determine which SDGs are most relevant to them, youth could become data collectors, and gather information on country-specific indicators. To make that happen, relevant government agencies like the Liberian Institute for Statistics and Geo-Information Services and the Liberian Ministry of Youth & Sports should be part of the conversation.

A skill-builder for youth

The SDGs offer countless possibilities for young people, whether it be gaining leadership experience or technical skills, and those benefits must be emphasized by the UN, governments, and international organizations to mobilize youth to take and lead action toward achieving the Global Goals.

In a globally competitive job market with limited educational opportunities, youth need to know that their involvement in SDG action, through tools like the SDG Youth Action Mapper, will benefit both themselves and their communities. Participation in projects that allow young people to gain a skillset, like Python coding or project management, could give young people credentials for employment.

Initiatives like the Youth Action Mapper can show the public the astounding work of young people everywhere, and the broader inclusion of youth in SDG implementation—advantageous to every country—will come from this whole-of-society approach that gives young people the tools and trust to make their communities, and the world, a better place.

Rachel Azafrani is a student at the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. With support from the School of Foreign Service, Georgetown’s Office of Fellowships and Research, the Social Innovation and Public Service Fund and the Georgetown International Relations Association, Inc., she conducted a needs assessment, partnership building and alpha roll-out of Creative’s SDG Youth Action Mapper in Liberia.

Moroccan youth map social services to prevent child labor

August 10, 2016

By Jillian Slutzker

4 min read

With clipboards in hand, middle school-aged youth in the Marrakech region are part of an educational program learning how to conduct some very valuable research that may help prevent child labor.

These apprentice researchers, ages 11 to 14, are part of a cadre of 67 trained “youth mappers” in the Marrakech-Tensift-Al Haouz region helping to create a database, and ultimately visual maps, of available social services in their communities. Using the Creative Mapper approach, they do this after school and as volunteers for local organizations.

As the youth researchers visit health clinics, microfinance institutions, childcare facilities, student dormitories, religious centers and other civil society organizations, they interview staff and catalogue the services offered by each institution. Together, these services can build a social safety net that may provide a family the extra support needed to keep a child in school rather than sending her to work.

“The principal cause for school dropout and child labor is certainly economic and social conditions of the family and accessibility to services,” says Nadia Mannaoui, Creative Mapper trainer and Livelihoods Specialist for the Promise Pathways project, which implements the Creative Mapper initiative.

The Promise Pathways project aims to reduce child labor in the Marrakech-Tensift-Al Haouz area and reach more than 5,500 youth and 1,000 family members. The project is funded by the U.S. Labor Department and implemented by Creative Associates International, along with several local partners.

Mapping to end child labor

An estimated 92,000 Moroccan children ages 7 to14 are working—often in hazardous labor such as agriculture, domestic labor or artisanal sectors—according to Morocco’s High Commission for Planning.

In the Marrakesh-Tensift-Al Haouz region alone, up to 14,000 children are already working or are at great risk of becoming agricultural and domestic laborers.

The Promise Pathways project is partnering with youth, the government and communities to mitigate school dropout. The project also support vocational training providers and employers in providing safe and productive employment for youth of legal working age.

Simultaneously, the project aims to boost household resilience by promoting families’ access to wraparound social services, micro-lending and saving programs.

“At the same time one works on increasing household revenues, one also has to link them to a plan of service for the development of the family,” says Mannaoui.

But first, the community needs to know these wraparound services exist—which is where the youth mappers play a critical role, mapping what services are available and identifying the gaps in a given community.

“Our main goal is to recognize and identify the services within our town,” says twelve-year-old Chihab al-Zimrani, a youth mapper in the rural, mountainous town of Imintanoute, about 80 miles from Marrakech.

A key to making this exercise successful, explains youth mapper coach Badr al-Din Ait Bin Hida, is raising awareness in the community about the purpose of Creative Mapper and, subsequently, its findings.

Bin Hida coaches a team of youth mappers, including al-Zimrani, in Imintanoute where, he says, poverty is a serious challenge. If a family is poor and cannot afford school fees, he explains, then they feel they must send their son to work.

However, Bin Hida explains that if this family is made aware of services available in the community—micro-lending, for example, or free school transportation—and how to access them, then the family’s economic situation may improve. The more families taking advantage of such a social safety net will ultimately mean fewer children working, which is the goal for Creative Mapper coaches and mappers.

“I will know that Creative Mapper has fulfilled its purpose if we go out and see no more child labor, no more children cleaning shoes,” says Bin Hida. “This will be our indication that Creative Mapper has done its work.”

Empowering young community leaders

As the lead researchers, youth are the driving force behind Creative Mapper. They are also the key to its long-term success, says Mannaoui.

“When a project intervenes, there is a limited duration…We want these youth to gain a consciousness about their environment and develop the skills to change it. They are the women and men of the future,” she says.

Through the Creative Mapper process, the Promise Pathways team is equipping these young Moroccans with those skills to create positive change.

In intensive two-day training sessions prior to hitting the streets for their surveys, youth mappers learn communication and research skills. They practice interview techniques and discuss ways to raise awareness about Creative Mapper and mobilize the community.

When the actual surveying begins, the youth put their training to work—taking the lead in reaching out to community organizations and working together to diagnose problems they find, and then begin to generate solutions so families can better access services.

The end results, says Mannaoui, is a boost in the youth’s confidence and capacity, as well as a benefit to the larger community in its fight against child labor.

“Creative Mapper has a double objective,” she says.

In addition to the obvious benefits of mapping social services, Creative Mapper helps develop self-esteem, responsibility and decision-making skills. These are life skills that you will not necessarily get in school, she says.

For bin Hida, the coach in Imintanoute, supporting these young people and watching their transformation into community leaders is inspiring.

“The youth can do many things and this helps grow their confidence. Even though they are young, they are talented and creative,” he says. “I don’t feel like I’m the one who is giving here because they are really teaching me.”

Funding for this project was provided by the United States Department of Labor. This material does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the United States Department of Labor, nor does the mention of trade names, commercial products, or organizations imply endorsement by the United States Government.

Northern Nigerian groups trained to support 36,000 out-of-school children

August 3, 2016

By Boco Abdul

3 min read

Leaders from more than 40 local civil society organizations graduated from specialized, intensive trainings that will enable them to provide early grade and adolescent education to 36,000 children who are out of school in two Nigerian states.

Organized and managed by the USAID-supported Northern Education Initiative Plus, the participants successfully mastered the course’s topics—ranging from promoting basic reading in key communities to resource mobilization—which are required before they receive grants that will enable them to enroll these and other vulnerable children into 800 non-formal learning centers in Bauchi and Sokoto states.

John Abu Yusuf, Executive Director of African Community and Environmental Health Initiative, was one of the 82 participants in the one-week training in Bauchi to learn how to open and eventually expand the non-formal learning centers. A second, similar training session was conducted in Sokoto with 21 organizations at the end of July.

“The training has been most educative and informative,” says Yusuf, who attended the training in July. “I have found the training on leadership and also project management tools to be very useful. Personally, I wish I had this information earlier. This will help my organization plan, implement and monitor projects effectively.”

The five-year, Nigerian government-led Northern Education Initiative Plus seeks to improve access and quality of education for more than 2 million school-aged children and youth in three northern states.

Funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development, the program will enhance the states’ ability to provide quality education—especially for girls, orphans and children enrolled in nontraditional schools—and improve children’s reading skills. The Initiative will be implemented in Bauchi and Sokoto states. A third state will be announced.

In addition, the participants learned how to develop and manage organizations that are essential to the educational initiative. These include: Center Based Management Committees that support the non-formal learning centers; School Based Management Committees that support formal schools; Parents Teachers Associations; and Women Groups and Community Coalitions that advocate for school improvement plans.

Yusuf sees how community engagement in general and these organizations in particular are critical to the ongoing success of the non-formal learning centers.

“Knowing we are working with these community structures, we will definitely build their capacity to be sustainable and effective,” Yusuf says. “We want them to be able to utilize these tools so that at the close out of the project, they are able to stand on their own and have a greater impact on their communities.”

Changing lives through education

Through the Northern Education Initiative Plus, each of the 20 local government areas supported by the project in Bauchi and Sokoto states will have 30 non-formal learning centers, five youth learning centers and five adolescent girls’ centers.

Students at these centers will learn literacy, basic math and vocational skills and, at the end of the program, receive a certificate that provides the opportunity to further their education in a formal school.

Classes will be led by facilitators who are chosen by the communities and trained by the project to deliver a learner-centered curriculum.

Loveth Ibrahim, a staff member of Reproductive Health Initiative and Support Association, who participated in the training is particularly passionate about girls having access to education.

“I want to see more girls get a chance at education and that journey starts with these new skills I have now acquired,” said Ibrahim, who was joined at the training by her one-year-old daughter. “I realize that the knowledge I have acquired here will not end with me but in the community.”

The training was informed by Creative’s Organizational Capacity Assessment Tool—an interactive capacity self-assessment tool that assists organizations in identifying strengths and weaknesses and developing improvement plans to build capacity.

Returned Peace Corps Volunteers advance Creative’s mission

August 2, 2016

By Karen Ives

5 min read

When Monnie Heminthavong was 7 years old, she and her family fled Laos in 1979 and traveled across the globe to Yorkville, Ill. Though they had never heard of Yorkville, she immediately felt at home in the small town.

The community, and particularly the local Unitarian churchwomen, helped her family resettle, providing support and opportunities.

Heminthavong decided she wanted to return that generosity and in 1993 joined the U.S. Peace Corps as a way of “getting back to give back.” She served as an Agroforestry volunteer in Cameroon from 1993 to 1997 and the experience left an indelible mark on her.

“It was one of the most gratifying and satisfying things I’ve ever done,” she says.

For Heminthavong and returned volunteers like her, Peace Corps service prompted a lifelong passion for development.

Established in 1961 by President Kennedy, the Peace Corps fosters positive relationships and friendship around the world by providing developing countries with skilled labor that can train the workforce, share U.S. culture and learn about the host countries in which they work and live.

At that time, President Kennedy probably did not realize that it would create a cadre of well-trained, culturally aligned returned volunteers who could work on some of today’s toughest development challenges.

Heminthavong, who now serves as a Contracts Administrator at Creative Associates International, is one of nearly a dozen returned Peace Corps Volunteers on staff. For the company, these returned volunteers bring a commitment to service that aligns strongly with Creative’s mission to support people around the world to realize the positive change they seek.

“Our Creative community is richer and our technical work is stronger because of the diverse experiences of our staff,” says Leland Kruvant, President of Creative. “Peace Corps Volunteers bring a community-oriented approach and cross-cultural communication skills that help us live out Creative’s mission and values.”

During a two-year assignment, Peace Corps volunteers gain experience in a community-driven style of development. They apply skills in appreciative inquiry to identify local needs and conditions and apply an understanding of the importance of language and local culture to of cross-cultural communication.

Jeffrey Coupe, who was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Togo from 1982 to 1984, is now a Senior Associate in Creative’s Education Division. He says the Peace Corps experience carries over to all facets of development.

“It was a life changing experience—for me anyway,” says Coupe. “I continued working in development and I enjoyed working on a USAID project as part of my Peace Corps experience and I think that helped in many ways because I had professional responsibility and I had to report on my activities.”

A broader perspective on complex development

With hands-on experience working on education initiatives in The Gambia, Creative’s Technical Manager Jake Thomsen says he better understands the key role community plays in supporting education, especially in conflict zone like Northern Nigeria (pictured above). Photo by David S

In addition to building skills like collaboration, flexibility and language ability, Peace Corps Volunteers experience firsthand the complexities of a country and region and understand how complicated and politicized those contexts can be. This is a key perspective for implementing development projects, particularly in the conflict and crisis-affected environments where Creative works.

When political unrest erupted in Burkino Faso in 2015, David Newstead—a Data Analyst at Creative and returned Peace Corps Volunteer who had served in neighboring Togo—recognized something familiar about the rebels who raided the presidential residence.

“They’re the same type of guys who used to wait at the taxi stands in Togo,” he says.

Young, unemployed and disenfranchised. Newstead had seen men like this in Togo. To him, these men weren’t just rebels, but a population who had been marginalized and down-trodden by a host of other factors, including economic and societal.

Through their experiences, many of Creative’s returned Peace Corps Volunteers say they learned the value of engaging the community in every step of a project to ensure that it achieves it goals and serves the intended target population. Community engagement is key to accountability.

As Peace Corps Volunteer in The Gambia, Jake Thomsen, currently a Technical Manager in the Education in Conflict Practice Area at Creative, helped the headmaster at an elementary school apply for and win a grant to build a library. It was a significant achievement his early days in development—and the library was to become a critical tool for the community.

Thomsen also helped the library procure several boxes of donated books. Unfortunately, because of some of the funds were siphoned by a school official, there wasn’t enough money to buy furniture, Thomsen says. By the time Thomsen left The Gambia, the books were still in boxes and the library was still not operational.

Nonetheless, Thomsen says it was a learning experience for him.

“To me, that was a powerful example of the need to be careful to involve the community, to make sure one person isn’t running the show and making dubious decisions,” says Thomsen.

Creative’s returned Peace Corps Volunteers also report that their experiences gave them a richer understanding of cross-cultural communication and better insight into the beneficiaries’ perspectives. Volunteers say they learned to build personal relationships across cultures and understand how these relationships can lead to positive change in the lives of individuals.

Peace Corps “gives you the perspective of a beneficiary that you wouldn’t get unless you lived with them for an extended period of time,” says Meaghan Buksas, a Proposal Manger at Creative who served with Peace Corps in Ecuador.

She says her service helped her develop the ability to observe critically in order to better understand people, situations and opportunities.

Bringing the experience home to Creative

Returned Peace Corps Volunteers are applying their experiences to the work they do at Creative. Because of their experiences abroad, they bring practical knowledge and a down-to-earth approach to development.

Peace Corps Volunteers “bring practical knowledge to the work we conceptualize,” explains Heminthavong. “Being in the field helps put context into what we do”

While it can be a big transition to go from working at the grass roots level to working at the headquarters level with an established international development organization, the returned Peace Corps Volunteers at Creative are up to the challenge.

“To me, it’s a way of coming full circle,” says Newstead. “In Peace Corps, you’re really in the weeds while at development organizations like Creative you get a birds-eye view.”

This birds-eye view often means working in development capacities most Peace Corps Volunteers haven’t encountered during their service, including work at the policy level.

“Here we deal a lot with policy,” says Thomsen. “We’re working with governments to help them perhaps develop their policy or improve their education policy or implement and operationalize their policy, but it’s a learning experience.”

For Creative, these returned Peace Corps volunteers help advance the organization’s mission with their insight into on-the-ground implementation and fierce dedication to the communities Creative partners with and serves.

The Peace Corps “made me a stronger and better person,” says Heminthavong. “I want to continue to provide service and uplift the way I have been uplifted.”

Women in Niger declare candidacy in local elections

July 20, 2016

2 min read

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Women in Niger declare candidacy in local elections

By Jillian Slutzker

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”2/3″][vc_column_text]When citizens in Niger’s Tahoua and Dosso regions head to the polls in January 2017, they will find something new on their ballots—the names of several female candidates.

Djermakoye Maimouna, a resident of Dosso, will be one of these candidates.

“I am going to [run] in the coming local elections,” she says proudly. “Men have dominated all the leadership positions in Niger for [too] long, leaving us only as child bearers.”

Despite a national 15 percent quota for female members of parliament, women have been gravely underrepresented in elected office at the local level. Traditional gender norms about the roles of women, coupled with limited knowledge about their own political rights and responsibilities, have kept women like Maimouna from participating in political processes in the past.

But Maimouna and other women across Niger’s eight regions are now standing up to declare their candidacy for local elections, thanks to a series of workshops designed to strengthen the capacities of women leaders to play an active role in the political process.

The trainings were supported by the USAID Reacting to Early Warning and Response Data in West Africa project, implemented by Creative Associates International.

Fatima Moussa Kako (center), President of Coordination des Organisations Non-Gouvernementales Féminines Nigériennes, presents at a training on how to promote women’s inclusion and mitigate potential electoral violence in upcoming elections.

The workshops, which were carried out by the women’s umbrella organization Coordination des Organisations Non-Gouvernementales Féminines Nigériennes (CONGAFEN) also targeted women leaders, opinion influencers, religious heads and youth with training on how to promote inclusion and mitigate potential electoral violence in upcoming elections. The workshops trained 805 people in total, including 416 women.

“The inclusion of women and other marginalized groups in elections offers them a forum to have a voice in how they are governed,” says Jeffrey Carlson, Director of Electoral Education and Integrity at Creative. “Such inclusion can lead to greater participation in more peaceful political processes as frustration among these underrepresented and disenfranchised sectors of the population is reduced.”

As she prepares for her impending electoral race, Maimouna says she owes her “new spirit” to the empowering trainings provided by the project.

In the neighboring Tahoua region, Abani Aichatou is another new female candidate for the January local elections and another powerful advocate for women playing an equal and active role in the political system.

“We the women have been fooled for a long time,” she says. “Through the training, I have realized that women can become candidates too. I will surely [run for office] during the coming local elections in Tahoua.”

With reporting by Fatima Moussa Kako, President of Coordination des Organisations Non-Gouvernementales Féminines Nigériennes (CONGAFEN)[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/12″][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/4″][vc_widget_sidebar sidebar_id=”sidebar-primary”][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Recognizing resilience, rebuilding livelihoods in South Sudan

July 6, 2016

By Angelina Tracy

3 min read

Photo credit: USAID U.S. Agency for International Development. Jonglei Food Security Program South Sudan. https://www.flickr.com/photos/usaid_images/ — Photo credit: USAID U.S. Agency for International Development. Jonglei Food Security Program South Sudan.

Editor’s note: This piece was written and posted prior to the outbreak of violence in Juba on July 8 and does not reflect these developments.

I recently returned from South Sudan. As the newest country on Earth, this place should have been full of hopes following its independence, but instead the new country continues to struggle with political rivalries, violent conflict and massive displacement.

For several generations, South Sudan has experienced almost continuous conflict leading to extremely low levels of infrastructure, agricultural productivity, market development, literacy and public health.

The latest civil war has affected different communities in different ways. In some regions, such as Unity, conflict and insecurity have become a daily fact of life. In others, such as Lakes, Jonglei and Eastern Equatoria, the civil war has served to exacerbate and militarize inter-group tensions and traditional resource conflicts, including those over cattle and grazing territory.

Northern Bahr el Ghazal, which was largely unaffected by direct military confrontation, has witnessed recent violence around Wau triggered by a growing tide of returnees and internally displaced persons—straining already limited local resources.

When control over scarce resources or economic assets can be a matter of life and death, even minor disputes can lock subsistence communities into a lethal cycle of violence and retribution.

The resilience-livelihoods connection

Despite these struggles and the many reasons to lack hope, there is a powerful counterweight to conflict in the country—the resilience of many South Sudanese. It was enlightening to see the smiles of women and children as we steered outside of central Juba for walks in local villages along White Nile.

That people still smile as they struggle to survive and earn a livelihood amid the chaos is a reminder that many individuals and communities demonstrate incredible resilience. These communities have developed strong coping mechanisms around their traditional and religious norms, supported by joint asset recovery planning and implementation, which development projects can build upon to help foster stability.

According, to the 2015 United Nations Development Programme report on South Sudan “Search for a New Beginning,” nearly two-thirds of those surveyed nationwide lost a close family member due to the recent conflict, and the same number experienced damage or loss to their homes.

Many have also lost their livelihoods, which in several ways can equate to a loss of identity and purpose. This is exacerbated by displacement due to conflict and compounded by exposure to trauma.

Yet, as evidence suggests, livelihoods interventions, along with education, are the strongest predictors of recovery after a conflict. For example, in communities most affected by the Lord’s Resistance Army conflict in Northern Uganda, livelihoods occupation and the level of education of a head of household were shown to correlate to the household’s ability to improve household assets and food security.

Keys to conflict-sensitive livelihoods programming

In complex environments such as South Sudan, well-designed and conflict-sensitive livelihoods interventions, along with asset recovery, should foster socialization, reduce anxiety, revive positive memories and start laying the foundation for shared values and identity.

Solutions must come from within the community based off of their needs. Programs need to offer different things to different people, whether that may include vocational training, micro-credit or other assets.

A participatory process is needed to identify a community’s main challenges and then encourage the community’s key change agents to facilitate addressing those challenges. The starting point for program design is such a community-based process that enables a discussion among community members about their particular economic environment as well as the psychosocial effects of conflict and peoples’ experiences.

Relationships are key factors in rebuilding traumatized communities—supportive community and peer relationships are foundations for wellbeing. Further, only local peer groups and communities have the power to define a key problem, such as the need to reintegrate youth soldiers, and take steps to address it through individual and collective action.

Healing takes time; there are no “quick fixes”. The reality is that people respond to initiatives differently based on their vulnerabilities. Similarly, programs too must respond and adapt differently to new realities on the ground. Most importantly, it is critical to build up local capacities and utilize already existing resources.

Angelina Tracy is Business Development Director for the Economic Growth Division at Creative Associates International. She is a specialist in rural development & livelihoods.

As an Atlas Corps fellow at Creative, I have new tools to bring back to Liberia

June 23, 2016

5 min read

In January 2015, I started my journey as an Atlas Corps fellow at Creative Associates International in Washington, D.C. I still remember traveling from my native Liberia and arriving in Washington on that winter day, and experiencing total culture shock: the cold weather, the reliable electricity, the people and even simple things like the transportation systems—especially the fascinating Metro system.

It is now time for me to transition to the next phase of my life and career. As an old adage says, “Every ending is a new beginning, we just don’t know it at the time.” I believe that every ending reveals great vistas and wonderful new opportunities.

Technology for Development (Tech4Dev) has been my passion and been pivotal to my career, long before I came to the U.S. and began working at Creative in the Creative Development Lab.

Prior to the Atlas Corps Fellowship, I spent four years supporting development organizations and projects to use geospatial and other Tech4Dev tools to do everything from monitoring elections and building an open government and citizen engagements system to creating early warning and early response systems and coordinating the Ebola response activities in Liberia. Before I came to Creative, I was just a typical young Tech4Dev enthusiast, inward-looking and unaware of the scale of the impact that technology can create globally.

But joining Creative was a game changer.

Getting the opportunity to join a recognized international development organization (with nearly four decades of experience delivering on-the-ground development services and sustainable solutions) to assist with ushering in a geospatial revolution across its work was both challenging and promising.

Passion, dedication & technology

The Creative Development Lab team has the energy, passion and collective technical and intellectual knowledge to provide solutions for some of the world’s toughest challenges. A lot has been written about the capabilities of the Development Lab and its work but, at its the heart, the evolution of the Lab is a testament to the power of ideas, collaboration and technology.

During my time with the Creative Development Lab, we built tools with the potential to scale globally and continue to contribute to some of Creative’s most important projects in lesser-developed and crisis-prone regions across the globe.

We have incubated and launched the CreativeMapper, which has brought geospatial thinking and action to our work. The CreativeMapper tool, powered by Geospago, is a set of processes and technological tools that allow community members, project staff and other stakeholders to collaborate on mapping important community challenges and assets—such as education services for out-of-school youth, crime patterns or incidents of electoral violence.

The maps generated become valuable resources for communities and their governments, expanding access to information and catalyzing important dialogues on local needs and priorities.

In addition to the CreativeMapper, the team accomplished a lot. Here are a few highlights:

Developing and launching the SDG Youth Action Mapper
Hosting the2015 PeaceHackDC in collaboration with International Alert
Reaching Internally Displaced Persons and Refugees in Northern Nigeria
Implementing USAID’s All Children Reading (Makhalidwe Athu) Initiative in Zambia

These are just a few of our accomplishments; there are many more and I am sure many yet to come. Above all, we have affected lives and brought the power of the technology to our pursuit of helping people across the world realize the positive change they seek.

During my time at Creative, I wrote about a variety of topics such as the SDGs and the data imperative and how real time data can help reduce violence in Central America. I was given the opportunity to attend and present at several global conferences and forums such as the FedGIS Conference, GEOINT Symposium and the Alliance for Peacebuilding Annual Conference.

Another touching moment during my fellowship was the week of April 25, 2015, when I joined the Standby TaskForce to create a volunteer group of digital humanitarians.

Tech4Dev & Nepal earthquake

This group collected, curated and interpreted information to assist and accelerate the coordination of humanitarian groups responding to the Nepal earthquake. We processed an extraordinary range of data streams during the 12 days of the deployment: geo-located pictures and messages of needs and offers of assistance. We provided maps and tables and supported other organizations and groups to streamline their processes.

The volunteer group I led worked closely with many other groups throughout the period of 7.8 magnitude earthquake that claimed more than 8,800 lives and injured 23,000. You can read about our efforts and success over the on the TechChange blog.

I have grown tremendously both professionally and personally over the last year and a half. I have learned a lot about people and project management, diversity and the importance of teamwork. I am eternally grateful to my supervisors and colleagues at Creative who have joined me on this Atlas Corps journey and shared the dream of improving humanity.

It has been an honor to work with and serve this team of extraordinary people, witnessing their dedication and recognizing that to change the world, you have to give everything. I am so proud of what we have achieved together. So many amazing people at Creative have inspired me to think about strategy, scale, practical execution and sustainability.

While the lessons have been exponential these questions in the Tech4Dev sector remain mostly unresolved and will form part of what I continue to work on as I transition to the tech4dev scene in Africa.

Creative Associates and the Atlas Corps Fellowship have prepared me in so many ways for the next phase of my life and career. I’ve been empowered with the tools, knowledge and experience needed to ramp up the technology for development and social change revolution back home in Liberia and Africa at large.

As many young professionals in international development would tell you, the sector can enrich you while it challenges you, and ultimately it will reshape you. I saw many gaps in the international and local ecosystems that can be tackled by innovative technology, a better understanding of the complex systems and a sincere commitment to making the world a better place.

So, as I prepare to transition back home to the next phase of my life and career, I am certain that there are and will be obstacles and challenges on the road ahead. Fortunately, I’ve learned that we have to take chances. All life is chance anyways. As Dale Carnegie once said, “The man who goes farthest in his life and career is generally the one who is willing to do and dare,” and this is especially true in the technology for development sector.

With my head filled with dreams and vision for the future, I carry back with me the invaluable lessons and experiences from Creative , the Atlas Corps Fellowship and the wonderful city of Washington, D.C. I know that new beginnings are both exciting and daunting but the passion for making the world a better place is my invaluable companion as I return home.

ZAMBIA: Transforming education, creating a nation of readers

June 14, 2016

2 min read

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Zambia:

Transforming education, creating a nation of readers

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”2/3″][vc_column_text]Zambia has traditionally registered the lowest literacy scores in its region. In just two years, however, Zambian students have made substantial gains in seven key areas of early grade reading. Working hand-in-hand with the Ministry of General Education, schools and communities, USAID’s Read to Succeed project contributed to this growth. By focusing on sustainable education systems, the program will help foster the next generation of readers.[/vc_column_text][vc_separator][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width=”2/3″][vc_column_text]

MIDLINE SURVEY REVEALS ZAMBIAN CHILDREN READING LIKE NEVER BEFORE

Zambian second and third graders are experiencing something today their older siblings did not—reading with improved ability. A midline survey from USAID’s Read to Succeed project reports substantial gains in seven key areas of early grade reading.

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SUSTAINABLE SYSTEMS MEAN MORE YOUNG ZAMBIANS WILL BECOME READERS

In nearly five years, the USAID Read to Succeed project has worked in sync with the Ministry of General Education, providing technical assistance while the Ministry has taken the lead for sustainable progress in early grade reading.

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“HEAVEN IS NOT THE LIMIT” FOR COMMUNITY & SCHOOL PARTNERSHIPS IN ZAMBIA

Samuel Kanshanda is a familiar face around Mabumba Primary School in Luapula Province. As the chair of one of 1, 224 School Community Partnership Committees, he and his neighbors are leading an education transformation.

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PSYCHOSOCIAL SUPPORT BRINGS “CHANGE FOR THE BETTER” FOR VULNERABLE ZAMBIAN STUDENTS

Thirty-four adolescent students who had dropped out of school returned to their classes last year at Kasonge Primary School, thanks to a combination of robust psychosocial services and support as part of the USAID Read to Succeed project.

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Former USAID Assistant Administrator joins Creative as Senior Vice President

June 8, 2016

2 min read

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Former USAID Assistant Administrator joins Creative Associates International as Senior Vice President

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”2/3″][vc_column_text]WASHINGTON, D.C. – Earl Gast, a global development expert with more than two decades of experience managing results-driven programming, will join Creative Associates International as a Senior Vice President.

In this new role, Gast will oversee the Education Division—which is Creative’s oldest unit—and the Economic Growth Division, the organization’s newest division. Together, these two divisions have projects in eight countries.

Creative Chief Operating Officer Pablo Maldonado said the Education and Economic Growth Divisions have grown their project portfolios, including new programs in Nigeria and Nicaragua, during the past year and are expected to continue that upward movement.

“Earl’s deep experience will greatly benefit our clients, host governments, implementing partners and beneficiaries,” says Maldonado. “It is this type of high-caliber talent that allows Creative to develop innovative, locally focused programs that result in positive changes for beneficiaries.”

Former USAID Assistant Administrator

Most recently, Gast was a Senior International Advisor at Covington & Burling, LLP, in Washington, D.C., where he co-led the firm’s Africa Practice since December 2014.

Previously, he was a senior U.S. government executive with 24 years of experience in international development and foreign policy.

Appointed by President Obama and confirmed by the Senate, in April 2012 he was sworn in as the Assistant Administrator for the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Africa Bureau, USAID’s largest bureau, which at that time had program resources of more than $8 billion covering more than 40 countries on that continent.

During his tenure as Assistant Administrator, Gast initiated new partnerships and Presidential initiatives, including Power Africa and Trade Africa, and leveraged funds from multiple global organizations to achieve greater scale and results. He also worked across U.S. government agencies and with the White House to draft the President’s Strategy for Africa.

Gast earned awarded a master’s degree in political science and Middle East studies in 1987 from The George Washington University. He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Maryland in 1984 with a bachelor’s degree in history and criminal law. In addition to his native English, Gast speaks Russian and Arabic.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/12″][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/4″][vc_widget_sidebar sidebar_id=”sidebar-primary”][/vc_column][/vc_row]

“Heaven is not the limit” for community & school partnerships in Zambia

June 2, 2016

By Jillian Slutzker

5 min read

Samuel Kanshanda is a familiar face around Mabumba Primary School in Luapula Province. He chats frequently with the head teacher and parents about the performance of learners and spearheads plans for school improvement.

But Samuel is not a teacher and does not have any children at this school. Nonetheless, as Chair of the Mabumba School Community Partnership Committee, his commitment to improving the school and providing a high quality education for his community’s children is robust.

The School Community Partnership Committee “is going to be here forever,” he says. “We are eager to work to make sure the school goes up. Heaven is not the limit.”

The committee Kanshanda leads is part of a “whole school, whole teacher, whole learner” approach to improve learning, teaching, school management, parental and community support and responsiveness to a child’s psychosocial needs across more than 1,200 primary schools in six Zambian provinces.

Called Read to Succeed, the five-year project aims to improve reading among learners in grades 1 to 4 in their local Zambian languages. The project is funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development and implemented by Creative Associates International.

Support from parents and community members like Kanshanda is a critical to the project’s success.

Across Zambia, the project has formed 1, 224 School Community Partnership Committees that facilitate collaboration among school staff and community members to develop learner performance improvement plans, conduct outreach to neighbors to keep kids in school and lead school improvement projects.

Click here to see videos and stories from the special report, “Zambia: Turning the page for better schools.”

Making education a community matter

According to a midline survey report released in 2015, teachers have reported “that more parents and members of the community are increasingly engaged in learning activities, thereby enforcing a culture of accountability.”

Teachers invite parents to class to see for themselves the literacy techniques used in the classroom, so they can support their children’s learning at home. Learner assessment data is also shared with the committee so they can support and monitor learner performance improvement plans at the school.

“It is very important for parents to be involved because we are the custodians of the children and if the child develops, the country will develop and change. A child is an asset, and we never know if he will become a leader,” says Raphael Mulamba, head of the Mabumba School’s Parent Teacher Association, which works hand-in-hand with the School Community Partnership Committee.

In fact, since the USAID Read to Succeed project began in 2012, Parent Teacher Associations across the six provinces have increased the proportion of their discussions concerning actual teaching and learning quality from 20.4 percent in 2012 to 57.9 percent in 2014, according to the midline survey.

“This represents a growing appreciation for the value that parents place on learner performance,” states the report.

Reversing dropout by reaching families

In Kanshanda’s village and across rural Zambia, student absenteeism runs high. By the end of primary school, around 44 percent of Zambian students will have dropped out, according to the UNESCO Institute for Statistics.

Early marriages, teen pregnancy and economic pressures to work and support family income are among the top reasons students leave the classroom.

Through outreach to their neighbors, School Community Partnership Committee members are helping to reduce these numbers and convince parents to send these children back to school.

“What we do is if we identify a child who is about to leave school, we go to the parents and tell them about the importance of school and that children are our future leaders,” explains Laurent Mumba, a member of the School Community Partnership Committee at Mulundu Primary School in the Mwense District of Luapula Province.

Mumba also encourages more parents to get involved in supporting their children’s education by taking a more active role in following their progress, assisting them with homework and attending events and meetings at the school.

The 15-member committee is dedicated to reaching as many out-of-school children and their families as possible and giving every child in their area the opportunity to learn.

Their efforts have visible results. More desks are now filled at Mulundu Primary School and more young Zambians are gaining literacy skills.

“We have a number of pupils who would be out of school if it weren’t for the School Community Partnership Committee,” says committee member Joyce Kaluba.

Small grants & community commitment boost learning

With an abundance of community commitment and a small injection of resources, School Community Partnership Committees and school staff have made remarkable improvements to support student learning.

The USAID Read to Succeed project has issued more than $675, 000 in learner performance improvement grants to 1, 224 schools across Zambia through the Ministry of General Education. Parents and community members work together with teachers and school administrators to develop plans for the grants for innovations that will support learning at the school.

At Mulundu Primary School, a 2013 project grant was invested in reading materials and “talking walls”—a technique to post signs and stories all around school, including on trees, so students can always find something to read.

The Mabumba Primary School used grant funds to hold student reading competitions, relying on community members for additional support. The best readers earned school supplies as prizes, purchased with the grant. The community and school are also jointly constructing a reading shelter where learners can sit and enjoy stories outside of class, using grant funds and resources provided by the community.

In other schools, teachers have used the funds to produce their own books, and many parents have pitched in to write and produce their own stories for the students.

“We could see the innovativeness in the head teachers,” says Charles Mupeta, Provincial Resource Center Coordinator for Luapula. “They have put the grants to good use for the benefit of the learners.”

As communities begin to see the payoffs from their investments of time and resources in the form of climbing reading levels among their children, their engagement in the schools is growing.

In Luapula’s Chipili District, like in other districts across the province and across the country, education officials are taking note of this increased community engagement and what it means for the quality of education.

“That support is very vivid from the community,” says Charles Kabaso, District Education Board Secretary for the Chipili District. “That support is coming because of what they have seen from their children. Children who could never read and write are now able.”

With reporting by Nephas Hindamu

Sustainable systems mean more young Zambians will become readers

June 2, 2016

By Jillian Slutzker

4 min read

When Head Teacher Muonga Chibwili Dickson stepped into his leadership role at Mabumba Primary School in 2012, he faced a difficult road ahead.

Literacy levels were dismal, affecting student performance across subject areas and contributing to low teacher morale. In 2013, only 39 percent of the school’s second grade students met the standard for grade-level reading and writing.

But 2013 was also the year the school began to implement interventions with support from Read to Succeed—a U.S. Agency for International Development-funded project to build capacity in the Ministry of General Education and improve reading using a phonetic approach among learners in grades 1 to 4 in their local Zambian languages.

Active in more than 1,200 primary schools across six provinces, the USAID Read to Succeed project uses a “whole school, whole teacher, whole learner” approach to improve learning, teaching, school management, parental and community support and responsiveness to a child’s psychosocial needs. Creative Associates International implements the project

In 2015, after nearly three full years of implementation, more than 79 percent of the Mabumba second graders hit the mark for reading and writing. The school’s success is audible as young readers proudly stand in front of their classmates reading from storybooks, and others call out as they read the signs posted all over school as part of the project’s “Talking Walls” strategy.

At the helm of this great achievement, Dickson attributes the jumps in literacy at his school to a couple of key things—the adoption of effective, phonics-based teaching methods by Mabumba Primary School teachers and putting systems in place to keep supporting teachers so that future students will also get the chance to become great readers.

“From 2013 what we have done is to continue the program. We have continued to train our teachers so the program doesn’t die,” says Dickson.

As he speaks, he pulls out file after file, which catalogue the school’s plans for and records of community engagement, teacher professional development, and support to vulnerable learners among other key project components. As a zonal center school, Mabumba Primary School also takes the lead in sharing best practices across the school zone, benefiting countless teachers and students.

“All that we have learned from Read to Succeed we have kept in our files,” he adds.

Click here to see videos and stories from the special report, “Zambia: Turning the page for better schools.”

Sustainability from the ground up to the Ministry

In its nearly five years, the USAID Read to Succeed project has worked in sync with the Ministry of General Education, providing technical assistance while the Ministry has taken the lead. With this support, the Ministry has put in place a new National Literacy Framework, revised curriculum, school-based assessments, a school management framework and performance level descriptors.

“They filled up the gaps that the Ministry could not do,” says Chansa Chibesa, Senior Education Officer for Luapula Province.

Before the project began, for example, the Ministry of General Education did not have an accurate tool to measure and assess student performance, say officials.

Working within existing Ministry of General Education systems, the USAID Read to Succeed project has helped to strengthen a network of training and education support teams for school heads and literacy teachers from the national level down to the provincial, district, zonal and ultimately school level.

“The system of Read to Succeed is running very much in tandem with the Ministry,” says Simon Kanchebele, acting Provincial Education Standards Officer for Luapula, adding that the project has been instrumental in supporting the Ministry of Education’s literacy policy reform across the board.

In addition to the government’s support systems, head teachers like Dickson have completed Education Leadership and Management Training and serve as in-house supports for literacy teachers.

This layered system of support within the Ministry all the way down to schools means ongoing coaching for educators as they implement the phonics-based methodology for years to come.

“We are not saying this training ends with Read to Succeed. As much as the project has assisted, these trainings should be ongoing at the school level,” says Charles Mupeta, Luapula Provincial Resource Center Coordinator.

Motivated by the fruits of their labor

And Ministry officials say they have good reason to believe that the systems put in place by the project will endure, not just at the top level but on the ground at schools as well.

In a midline survey, released in 2015, Luapula Province second and third graders ranked the highest among the six project provinces in four key areas of reading—letter sound, non-word reading, oral reading passage and English listening comprehension.

In all six provinces, the midline survey showed that the performance of second graders increased by more than three-fold in four out of seven “subtasks” of reading measured. While there is still progress to be made in areas like writing and comprehension, educators and officials note that these are remarkable gains.

“Teachers, parents and administrators are quite happy. Their pride is to see an immediate result from their input. Teachers are leading with their heads high, knowing that their pupils can read,” says Chibesa. “I don’t see them abandoning Read to Succeed. They have seen the fruits of their labor.”

Looking ahead to the close of the project in 2017, education officials are certain that literacy levels will continue to climb and more and more young Zambians will gain literacy skills that will propel them to success in school and beyond.

“Even if Read to Succeed is not there, we are still going with that program to teach reading with the phonetic method. It is part and parcel of us,” says Simon.

With reporting by Nephas Hindamu

Psychosocial support brings “change for the better” for vulnerable Zambian students

June 1, 2016

By Jillian Slutzker

5 min read

Thirty-four adolescent students who had dropped out of school returned to their classes last year at Kasonge Primary School. What brought them back to school is fairly simple, says Head Teacher Goodson Chilando Mutuna.

“It is a matter of motivation…with the proper counseling they can change for the better,” he says.

Every one of these 34 boys and girls now has a better chance of finishing their education and succeeding in life, thanks to a combination of efforts including psychosocial support from the school’s guidance and counseling teacher, targeted outreach to families from community members, and peer to peer mentoring from a group known as Agents of Change.

These psychosocial initiatives are a key component of the Read to Succeed project, a “whole school, whole teacher, whole learner” approach to improve learning, teaching, school management, parental and community support and responsiveness to a child’s psychosocial needs in more than 1,200 schools across six Zambian provinces. The project is funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development and implemented by Creative Associates International.

The introduction of robust psychosocial services and training for educators is a welcome addition in a school system with a large number of vulnerable learners and previously few resources and know-how to support them.

“In the past, guidance and counseling services to learners were very few, but Read to Succeed has strengthened that assistance to learners,” says Charles Mupeta, Provincial Resource Center Coordinator for Luapula Province, where Kasonge Primary School is located.

Click here to see videos and stories from the special report, “Zambia: Turning the page for better schools.”

Countering dropout, reaching families

In rural Luapula Province, like in much of the country, poverty is widespread. Many students at Kasonge experience not only economic pressures but also the hazards of early marriage, teen pregnancy and HIV/AIDs, which has left many of them without one or both parents.

Whether children leave school to work, get married or care for others in a parentless household, the end result is the same—interrupted education and reduced prospects for wellbeing in adulthood.

For those vulnerable children and youth who manage to stay in school while dealing with social, economic and psychological challenges outside of the classroom, their learning will inevitably suffer.

“We know that if a child is affected socially, this child will not perform well,” explains Simon Kanchebele, Acting Provincial Education Standards Officer for Luapula Province.

It is a phenomenon all too familiar to the educators at Kasonge Primary School.

According to the latest school records, 84 children at the school have lost both parents. Another 123 have lost one parent, and 31 learners are considered vulnerable based on their precarious and impoverished living situations.

“Mostly the children we have at school come from eight rural villages. Most of them are coming from very poor families. They are double orphans, orphans or vulnerable children,” explains Mutuna.

But despite the challenges his young learners face, Mutuna says the guidance and counseling and outreach efforts are working—evidenced by the 34 youth once again filling the desks they had abandoned not long ago.

As the Mwense District’s Guidance and Counseling Coordinator, Mutuna has overseen the training of guidance and counseling teachers at all schools in the district in partnership with the USAID Read to Succeed project. The counselors are trained in how to identify, monitor and support orphans and vulnerable students, make referrals for services, and reach out to their families to encourage attendance and address psychosocial challenges at home that may impede learning.

When a student stops attending school, counselors team up with members of the School Community Partnership Committee to connect with families, discuss the obstacles preventing attendance, and work to develop solutions and reenroll learners.

“We know for sure that in a rural place like this, most parents have no regard for education…we have sensitized these parents,” says Mutuna.

Recently, when it became evident that many students in the district could not afford the pens and paper needed for class, guidance and counseling teachers helped provide school supplies to these vulnerable learners.

A powerful message from peers

As part of USAID Read to Succeed project, guidance and counseling teachers are also mobilizing a cadre of energetic and extremely effective allies to help support vulnerable students. Called Agents of Change, these groups of adolescents work side by side guidance and counseling teachers to deliver important messages to their classmates about staying in school, practicing healthy behaviors and making smart choices.

Agents of Change are trained on how to discuss sensitive subjects with their classmates like peer pressure, drugs and alcohol abuse, teen pregnancy and HIV/AIDs. The Agents of Change support their peers through challenging situations like the loss of parents, returning to school after a pregnancy or dropout, and resisting pressure to use drugs.

Dynes Musamba is only in the ninth grade, but as an Agent of Change at Mabumba Primary School in the Mansa District of Luapula Province, she is poised when discussing sensitive issues like teen pregnancy and peer pressure.

“Sometimes I just tell my friends: ‘If you have a problem, be frank with me and I can help and encourage you,’” she says.

Along with her seven fellow Agents of Change at Mabumba Primary School, she has helped bring friends back to school after they have dropped out, including teen mothers—an achievement in which she takes great pride.

“It is like a dream. I dreamed of helping others. It’s a great thing and I am very happy,” she says.

Through facilitated dialogues, skits and songs, she and her fellow Agents of Change also educate their peers on healthy behaviors, like how to avoid an HIV infection or pregnancy. The skits, say the Agents of Change, are especially powerful.

“They watch the skit as a movie and they keep it in their brains. After they finish, I tell them to sit down and think about it,” says seventh grade Agent of Change Mulenga Musamba.

At Mabumba Primary School alone, the group has delivered these key messages to dozens of their peers. Across the country, some 12, 330 Agents of Change are reaching thousands more youth with critical information about how to stay healthy and on track for education success, and how to access psychosocial support when in need.

In fact, since the project began in 2012, these Agents of Change have together reached 174,477 of their peers through regular monthly meetings in 1,233 schools.

“We have helped many people. We are coming to make sure we can all be someone in the future,” says ninth grade Agent of Change Isaac Songolo. “I am proud because we are saving their lives.”

With reporting by Nephas Hindamu