| My mum has never had a new car or even a nice car for that matter. so when we had the opportunity to upgrade our car we thought that instead of trading it in we would give it to mum for her birthday. Check out her reaction, it's priceless. |
|---|
Get heaps of tips and tools to help you live your full potential!
TEACHER TRAINING IN AFRICA!
MaZooNGa is partnering with 'Hope Rwanda', a charity based in Sydney Australia that is involved in building a village in Rwanda. There are three main teams involved in the charity, the building team which is building the homes for the widows and orphans in the village. The medical team, providing open heart surgeries for the villagers and the Education team. Ian and Karina Stephens, Founders of MaZooNGa will be assisting the Hope Education team in their efforts to provide teacher training and resourcing teachers.
In July, the Education team will head over to Rwanda to partake in the third teacher training program. It consists of 19 people, mainly Australian teachers,who have developed a curriculum training program, which will be implemented to 290 English teachers.
The intention of the program is to develop a group of teachers who will become "train the trainers", and have the resource and knowledge to equip existing and future Rwandan teachers with high level training and teaching techniques, procedures and programs. By doing this the teachers of Rwanda will become self sufficient and not reliant on ongoing assistance.
The team has been busy raising funding for USB memory sticks and teacher kits which will resource the 290 teachers who operate with hardly any resources. The classes can have up to 100 children in them with only one teacher. There is a blackboard with a stick of chalk but no paper. The children have no books or writing materials. The teachers usually have to work two jobs in order to make ends meet as the teaching is very low paying job with little reward.
People going into the teaching profession have minimal schooling themselves and so the profession itself is not viewed with high esteem. Our aim is to encourage and inspire the teachers as the Hope Education logo states, "Teachers, far more precious than gold". We hope to assist Rwanda to have men and women teachers, capable of raising and educating the future generation of African Leaders.
WHY HOPE EDUCATION?
1994-Rwandan Genocide- 1 million people killed in 100 days
1998- President Bill Clinton apologises for western inaction in the face of the Rwanda genocide.
2000- UN Millenium Development Goals established including universal free primary education. Rwanda adopts goals
2001-present day Rebuilding of a nation
Present day: being a teacher in Rwanda….
At present, only 8% of Rwandan students go on to secondary school. If a Rwandan student fails final secondary exams, they are often immediately employed as a teacher with little extra training. These teachers face class sizes of over 80 students on average. Current Rwandan teachers are often child survivors of the genocide, having faced severe trauma and dislocation. With poor pay, feelings of failure and minimal classroom management skills, Rwandan teachers are discouraged and often leave the profession.
Hope Rwanda Education Team is working in partnership with the Rwandan Ministry of Education to build capacity in Rwandan teachers through teacher inservice and training. Hope Education volunteers stand alongside Rwandan teachers, reaffirming that they are indeed more precious than gold and integral to the nation’s economic and social development. Rwandan syllabus material is used as a reference point. Hope Rwanda Education Team is also involved in the training of Preschool Teachers in Rwanda as there are less than a handful of preschools in Rwanda.
Results so far...
In only 2 years, Hope Rwanda Education Teams are having a positive impact on teaching skills and teacher retention rates and have embarked on a training pathway which will see the training of 180 expert Rwandan teacher trainers within 5 years. It just shows what a committed group of volunteers can do!
“…Education is the single most powerful means to improve the quality of life..it is the single most powerful weapon against poverty and intolerance….”
Federico Mayor
If you would like to know more or assist us then please email Karina more more information.
Home - E-Store - MaZooNGa - Personal Developement- Wealth - Relationships - Karina's Diary