Friday, June 1, 2007

Interactive Radio Instruction

As an education volunteer one of my jobs is to visit all the schools in my area to assess their progress and learn how I can best meet their needs. I work within the Petauke school District and within that the Nsenya school zone. In my zone there are 10 Government schools, which means that the government pays the teachers salaries, as well as provides most of the direct funding for the schools. These schools contain great and dedicated staff like my Zonal Head teacher seen below:

The buildings were often, but not always, built by the government and they tend to be among the best supported schools in the area. These schools tend to teach up to grade 8. Nsenya however currently has grade 9 and has plans for grade ten classrooms to be built later this year.

There are also community schools of which my area has 4. These schools have been built usually through the dedication of community members with the help from outside NGOs. Community schools often have a mix of government paid teachers and trained mentors who teach students. These schools usually receive a smaller fraction of support from the government, but their staff is no less dedicated, like Mr. Zulu pictured right at Nsamba community school. These schools also can have up to grade 8, but tend to stop by grade 5. After students finish at one school they are referred to the nearest school with the following grade however due to the distances involved and the costs that go along with that (students may need to attend school over 40 kilometers away) education can often end when their schools highest grade does.

Note: This is in fact a different day I just happen the same thing most days ;)

Finally there are Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI) centers. Currently there are 29 registered IRI centers in my zone. These centers began 7 years ago in an effort to educate the over 800,000 Zambian Children who were without access to education. The government of Zambia together with USAID and Peace Corps created a type of interactive radio instruction specifically for Zambia called "Learning at Taonga Market". This program is broadcast over the radio taught to the student with the help of a mentor. These IRI centers are sometimes simply an agreed upon location that the mentor and students meet at, sometimes a simple mud and thatch building, and in rare cases a brick building complete with a metal roof. Most IRI centers have grades 1, 2 and 3 but few currently have more than grade 5.

Above is one of my closest counterparts Moses Banda and a mentor at Ulemu IRI center. She is holding the radio on which she is able to receive the radio broadcasts and standing in front of her class of around 50 1st graders.

Below is Chamelenje IRI center with 2 mentors teaching 1st and 2nd graders with them. The students are often older than age 7 when entering grade one so you might notice some rather tall 2nd graders.



These centers are the leading edge in Zambia's attempt to full educate it's population. Currently the literacy rate in Eastern province is 49.7% (the lowest in the country).

From the beginning in 2000 IRI centers used IRI lessons to educate their students (as their name suggests). However due to the overwhelming success of the program IRI lessons have been expanded into all government and community schools as well. The government and community schools started with grade 1 this year, next year will include grade two in IRI lessons and so on. This is largely the result of a study comparing student success rates in both IRI centers and government schools. Students at the IRI centers preformed comparably with their government school peers despite the often much worse material conditions. With passing year more students will be receiving radio based lessons which provides a cost effective education for students who would otherwise have no education. However access both to schools and especially to grades 8 thru 12 remains quite concerning. I've got my work cut out for me. ;)

Workin' Life... not quite 9 to 5

I've now been an official volunteer for 2 months and I'm starting to see how my next two years will be spent. I have been visiting schools, meeting with district officials, and getting the lay of the land, literally. All of the people and places I visit I do so with my trusty bicycle so I can painfully attest to the accuracy of the 1950's topographical maps of the area, yes those 100 meter peaks and valleys do add up quickly! Today I met with the District Resource center coordinator to discuss the allocation of money to 4 IRI centers in my district. They will be awarded 10 million Kwacha (or just over 2,000 USD) to help construct buildings for them. Not a bad start however there are over 60 IRI centers in the district so we've still got a long way to go. The IRI centers will most likely be building classroom blocks for their schools, meaning a proper structure that will keep the rain out during the 3 to 4 month long rainy season. However both the basic schools and IRI centers in my area need lots of work. Here are a few of the projects that the schools in my area will be working and why :




Poultry: In order to raise more money for things like exercise books, chalk and teachers salaries schools often start Income Generating Activites. This can be a field on which the students grow corn to sell etc. My zonal head school will be starting a chicken coop in which they have chickens laying eggs to sell. We'll be setting that up as soon as we receive the start up money which should be any time from now....




Teachers houses: In order for another teacher to be sent to the school by the government a house has to built. As part of the teacher's salary housing is provided and it's a far trade since teachers often have to live in rural areas without friends or family nearby. However when schools are understaffed it can be quite a hurdle to overcome since buildings are expensive and funds aren't provided by the government. For this I'll be organizing communities to make bricks, and looking in all the places I know for funds after that.




More Classrooms: With over 100 kids in a classroom on occasion this one is self explanatory. For this too it will be working with locals to gather/make building materials and then helping them write grants for the cement, roofing sheets etc.



Library: As you might know I happen to be a reader. I love books and my villagers now tend to know that. I'll often crack open a book while cooking (cooking on a charcoal can take some time) or after a long bike ride. More often than not people will come up and start chatting with me while I'm reading, oh well, but one question that never stops coming up is "Are you reading the bible?" Despite Zambia being a christian nation the books I'm reading rarely look anything like the bible yet the question keeps coming up. It turns out it's not a subtle attempt at proselytizing but just the simple fact that 9 out of 10 books these people have assess to during their lives are in fact bibles. Nothing wrong with that per say but variety is the spice of life and the bottom line is these people need more books.



One of the schools in my area is interested in building a library. They have a few books and currently are raising money for windows in the library- however, they could always use more books! This is for a school with grades from 1 to 8 and English is taught in schools so language isn't a problem. If you are interested in collecting donated books ( from churches, libraries, schools etc) in your area, or just sending a few books to contribute that would be great. The US Post office will let you send 66 lbs of books for $10.00 in a M - Bag (Mailer bag: http://pe.usps.gov/text/imm/immicl/immicltz_026.html#NL508_26

Unfortunately the USPS has discontinued M-bags. If you are aware of another way to ship books cheaply to the Zambian Schools which desperately need them please let me know


So feel free to go ahead a send them.