From the Worldwide Faith News archives www.wfn.org


Baha'i News: Ugandan project doesn't stop at literacy


From Sally Weeks <sweeks@bwc.org>
Date Sun, 2 Nov 2008 18:34:54 +0200

>Baha'i World News Service
>http://news.bahai.org<http://news.bahai.org/
>For more information, contact: news@bahai.org<mailto:news@bahai.org

>Ugandan project doesn't stop at literacy

NEBBI DISTRICT, West Nile Region, Uganda, 2 November 2008 (BWNS) - Being li terate means being able to read useful information - that's why the first u nit in the UPLIFT literacy program tells how to treat malaria.

Later units deal with farming methods, nutrition, hygiene and safety, makin g compost, environmental challenges, and so on.

"When I compare my condition and that of my friends who have not attended U PLIFT courses, I can see a big difference," says villager Alisa Poli, speak ing in Alur, the main language in this part of Uganda.

Earlier this year - at the age of 63 - she began the UPLIFT program and alr eady can read.

The "T" in UPLIFT stands for transformation, a concept at the heart of the  program, says program director Hizzaya Hissani. The full name of the initia tive is the Uganda Program of Literacy for Transformation.

"UPLIFT uses literacy as a vehicle for social and economic transformation,"  explains Dr. Hissani, who with five fellow Baha'is began the program in 20 01.

Since that time, more than 6,700 local residents have completed the literac y training, and - with new support from the Norwegian and Ugandan governmen ts - UPLIFT has committed to training 4,000 more people by the end of 2009.

>What participants learn

Those who have been through the course - UPLIFT uses the term "learners" -  tend to talk about its holistic nature rather than the isolated skill of re ading.

"My attitude about things has changed a lot," says Kulastika Okwong, a 61-y ear-old mother of seven who has completed the UPLIFT training. "I was reall y ignorant. I didn't know how to treat malaria, and I didn't know how to ma ke compost.... We lived day-to-day. We ate all the food I produced, and we  had no savings."

Mrs. Okwong, whose husband is one of 10 field coordinators for UPLIFT, says  she used to feel like a "dependent" person; since going through the traini ng she feels more independent.

"I used to go to witch doctors when someone was sick, but now I try medici ne made of neem leaves. If that doesn't work, we go to the health center,"  she says. "I used to think that school meetings were a waste of time, but n ow I see they are important. Reading books is important, too."

For the past year she has worked as a community health assistant, appointed  by the government. She is one of about 10 former UPLIFT participants who h ave been asked to do this type of work.

"If it was not for UPLIFT, I wouldn't have been appointed," she says.

Mrs. Okwong and her family live in Ogido, one of 73 villages in the Nebbi D istrict where UPLIFT is active.

The Nebbi District - population 500,000 - is one of the poorest areas of Ug anda, located in the northwest section of the country, far from the capital  of Kampala and the international airport at Entebbe. Subsistence agricultu re and fishing form the basis of the local economy.

The district is divided into 19 subcounties, and UPLIFT is active in 11 of  them.
Dr. Hissani, who is originally from neighboring Kenya, first visited the We st Nile region of Uganda in 1999.

"I was shocked to find that 12 people had recently died of malaria," he rec ounts. "On further investigation, I found that these people were illiterate  and that there was gross land mismanagement in their farming operations."

He consulted with several Baha'i friends in Uganda who worked in developmen t and they came up with the idea of the UPLIFT program.

>How the program works

Dr. Hissani, who has a doctorate in the field of functional literacy, worke d out a curriculum that speeds literacy by having students learn certain ke y words, then break them down into syllables and use those syllables to for m new words.

Learning to read with texts that discuss malaria and farming methods - subj ects of immediate importance to the lives of the participants - helps motiv ate the students and makes the program more useful to them.

"The approach is to look at the needs of the community as a whole and to re late the content of the program to the lives of the learners," Dr. Hissani  said.

Each class is led by a trained mentor, who in turn reports to a coordinator . UPLIFT currently has about 100 active mentors, all volunteers, and 10 coo rdinators who receive small salaries. The program used to average about 45  people to a class, but with the expansion made possible by a grant from the  Norwegian government, and in-kind support from the Ugandan government, the  classes now average around 70 people.

Learners attend class - often in the open air, often sitting on mats - twic e a week for a year (except during harvest season). The experience of UPLIF T has been that about 90 percent of the participants become functionally li terate with the year.

So far the program has operated in the Alur language, but Dr. Hissani says  they have begun field-testing an English version. English and Swahili are t he official languages of Uganda but many other languages are spoken locally .

One key element of the program has turned out to be the response from women  in the Nebbi District - so far more than 80 percent of UPLIFT participants  have been female.

(Mrs. Okwong points out that as a child, her brothers were sent to school b ut she was obligated to stay home and cook and do domestic work. She says s he always was looking for the opportunity to learn to read and write.)

Another key to the success of the program is the acceptance of people from  different faiths - not just Baha'is but Christians, Muslims and others are  among the mentors and the learners. One of the activities now associated wi th UPLIFT is interfaith devotional programs where participants read passage s from different faith traditions.

>Results

Opio Hannington, a local official in the Panyango subcounty in the Nebbi Di strict, said his office has been working with UPLIFT for four years and tha t he is highly encouraged by results.

"UPLIFT has created a sense of unity, awareness to demand services, and coo peration," he said. "It has brought collaboration ... and understanding."

Hassan Ringtho, chairperson of the local government in Paidha subcounty, sa id UPLIFT has been particularly effective with older people.

"Before, old people thought that they could not learn," he said, "But now t hey believe they can learn.... Now they feel they have the ability to chang e their way of life."

He stressed the point that attitudes can change.

"If one used to spend the whole day drinking, and now he drinks for only on e hour, hasn't the attitude changed?" he asked. "People follow models and e xamples. UPLIFT officials are the models and examples."

Alfred Okwai, one of the UPLIFT coordinators, said the program specifically  tries to train mentors to be role models to the community.

"Most of our mentors are positively different from others who did not atten d the course," he noted.

Mrs. Poli, the 63-year-old who recently learned to read through the UPLIFT  program, recounts many ways her life has changed.

"Before, I could not bother with cleanliness at home," she says. "Now, afte r realizing that hygiene is the basis for health, I have built a pit latrin e, a kitchen, a drying rack, even an animal shelter."

She says she also has joined a small "savings group" initiated by some UPLI FT learners so that she could begin saving money.

(For the full article, with photographs, go to http://news.bahai.org/story/ 664)


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