Click to see a slideshow of photos from our trip.
Click here to see the photos used in the slideshow (if you use any in a project please cite this page )
NEWS FROM THE TANZANIA PROJECT 2013
On June 18th, a group of 14 people, comprised of 4 staff (Sue Worsnup, Margaret van Berkel, Kate Swift and Kelly Webber) and 10 students (Adele Williams, Casey Isherwood, Thom Neta, Kirstin White, Micah Holzer, Rebekah Beveridge, Elena Rueda Carrasco, Selina Good, Lili Melvin and Paula Faciolince) left ISA to go and run a 19-day programme with the Form 1 students from the MaaSAE (Maa Speakers Advanced Education) Girls Lutheran Secondary School (MGLSS) in Monduli, Tanzania. We flew to Kilimanjaro airport and then travelled nearly a 100 kilometers to the village of Monduli where the school is situated. ISA has been involved in this project since 1995, which has involved running summer school programmes for the Form 1 students as well as helping to support the school with some of its financial needs.
MGLSS opened in 1995, with the students coming from pastoralist tribes, Maasai, Barbaig and Hadzabe, with the majority being from the Maasai tribe. In Tanzania fewer than 10 percent of girls are able to attend secondary school. MGLSS was established to provide a secondary education for girls from pastoralist tribes with the focus being on families who have no means or desire to have their daughters educated. The parents and in particular the father, often do not recognise the value of education for their daughters or the resulting benefits for their community and traditionally, Maasai girls receive at the most a very basic elementary education. Each year at MGLSS, a group of around 60 students start in Form 1 and there are over 250 students in the school. The impacts of this newly educated generation of Maasai women are now being seen. As educated women they are now better equipped to confront challenging issues in their culture (such as: early arranged marriages, lack of girls’ education, female circumcision and gender violence) whilst still embracing the traditional values of close-knit families and their rich Maasai heritage. More than 550 students have graduated from Form 4 at MGLSS since the first graduation in 1999, and more than 250 of these graduates have continued onto higher education. Ex-Graduates of MGLSS are now to be found in: teaching (33 early childhood teachers, 65 primary teachers, 37 secondary school teachers), social work/community development areas (9), nursing (10), medical school (2), Clinical office training (6), Law (7), Journalism (9), Clerical work (10), Public Administration/ accounting (14) and Wildlife management (5) with one working as a pilot. The number of MGLSS graduates will be over 600 with the 2013 Form 4 graduation in October.
Following eight months of preparation, the ISA group arrived at the MGLSS in Monduli, full of anticipation and ready to meet the challenges that such a trip brings. The students we worked with started the school in October 2012, they have had some basic English at school and one of the aims of our programme is to help them to develop and communicate more in English. This we tried to encourage by providing a varied programme and working in smaller groups. We received a warm welcome at the airport by Dr. Msinjili (Head of School), Ciwila Shirima and Nanyouri Morris (Coordinators for the project) who had come to meet us. The next day we began teaching the Form 1 girls, who were very enthusiastic and keen to learn. Our daily routine followed a fairly strict schedule. Day breaks around 6.30am and we got up very shortly afterwards. Each day began with uji (maize porridge) for breakfast. We had lessons from 8.30 – 10.30, 11.00 - 13.00 and 13.30 – 15.30. We taught English, Library, Geology, Maths, Science, Arts and Crafts, First Aid and Sports. The ISA students did a fantastic job working with the MGLSS students, assisting in lessons and leading group activities. We also ran an evening programme from 19.15 – 20.45, which included games, dance, campfires, Arts and Craft activities. We enjoyed a Maasai cultural evening, prepared and presented to us by the Form 1 students in which they dramatized aspects of Maasai life including some of the difficulties that Maasai girls encounter in order to get an education and an arranged marriage. It certainly highlighted to our group that these Maasai girls encounter struggles and challenges that we don’t even have to consider.
During the trip we went with the MGLSS students to the Taranguire National Park. The MGLSS students were very excited about going on the trip and we had a fantastic day. The park is renowned for elephants and we saw certainly saw an amazing number roaming through it, as well as other wildlife. On this trip, we passed one of the safari lodges with a swimming pool. Most of the MGLSS students had not seen a swimming pool before. It resulted in much excited chatter as they watched a family swimming. One girl asked me why was the water blue? It does make one wonder if they were amazed to see so much water being used solely for recreational purposes.
We also went to visit a Maasai boma or family settlement, the home of one of the girls in Form One, where her father lives with his wives. The boma was in the upland area above Monduli on the edge of the Great Rift Valley. We were warmly welcomed and were shown around their homes and enjoyed the ceremonial singing and dancing. It was an amazing experience and extremely interesting to have a brief glimpse of a patriarchal society.
The trip to MGLSS is a real cultural experience for all involved and can be quite humbling to see the richness of life in hard circumstances. The opportunity to be able to spend time together, sharing and learning from each other, and making friendships are things we all really value. We all have many wonderful memories that we truly treasure and hope that you are able to see our photo display from our trip in the school foyer.
Fundraising for the Tanzania Project has gone on throughout the year by various groups. The Share Committee group has worked hard and raised a considerable amount of money for various charities that ISA supports and again donated money for the Tanzania Project. The Girls Helping Girls group through their sewing projects and the Tanzanian Student group also raised money for the project these donations enabled us to buy the required supplies and run the programme. The funds also paid for a trip to the Taranguire National Park for all the Form 1 students, which they enjoyed immensely. In addition to this, a financial donation was given to the school to further support their current needs. Dr. Msinjili, the Head of School, expressed on many occasions, thanks and gratitude for the continued support, help and kindness that ISA has been able give to the Maasae Girls School.
We once again visited the Heifer Project that ISA has over the years supported. This is a great addition to the project and enables group members to see clearly another and very different aspect of life in Tanzania. This organization supports people in need in developing countries by giving them livestock to help alleviate hunger and poverty. Besides the gift of an animal the person receiving it must take part in a training programme provided by the Heifer project to learn how to look after the animal correctly and its’ subsequent offspring. They must also agree to pass on the first offspring to another family and so the gift is then passed to another family. Heifer’s headquarters moved from Arusha to Dar Es Salam 18 months ago, and so we were not able to go to the headquarters but instead were met by two Heifer representatives in Moshi. In the past, the Heifer organisation has focused many of their project in Tanzania in supporting families / organization who are affected by the HIV virus. They have now expanded their support to helping families who have a mentally and /or physically challenged child. This is much needed in Tanzania as these families have in the past been left with no help or support. It is very encouraging to see the difference a goat makes to the lives of those concerned – the milk helping to provide a nutritious food source, with any excess being sold thus providing an income of its own, helping to pay school, housing and clothing costs.
On behalf of the ISA Tanzanian group, MGLSS and the Heifer Tanzania, I would like to thank all of you who have been involved in anyway raising / donating money for the Tanzania Project – your kindness, efforts and generosity are greatly appreciated.
Thank you to all or as they say in Swahili,
Asante Sana
Sue Worsnup (Tanzania Coordinator 2013)
NB. Without a scholarship 85% of the students would not be able to attend the school. Scholarships for MGLSS are administrated by OBA (Operation Bootstrap Africa). The cost of a full yearly scholarship is $900.00 per student. Many students have two sponsors, each providing half of the scholarship amount. If you are interested at all in helping to provide scholarships (designated to MGLSS) then please contact OPERATION BOOTSTRAP AFRICA at bootstrapd@aol.com for more information.