Executive Summary

Maasai Primary School Education project proposal is a project in Friends of Usambara Society (FOU). FOU is an organization founded in 1997 to support innovative community initiatives that promote education, health and entrepreneurship especially among young people.

FoU main concern is the realization of sustainable development in which the children, teachers and the community are involved in positive activities that will ensure socio-economic welfare in the entire locality and ensure proper learning environment by providing habitable accommodation. It is also in a way assisting Government attains the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) by providing ablution facilities at the school. The vision of FOU’S is peaceful co-existence and development in which everyone participate equally and effectively in problem and solution identification and where local communities, governments and other developmental bodies facilitate and carry out skills transfer to the younger generation who are not fortunate enough to be afforded or even to go to school.

FOU’S has furthermore succeeded to hold three successful meetings with the School Development Committee (SDC) and community Heads to forge an understanding of our vision and goals. We made sure that there is community ownership of the project. There is a need to involve everyone and have to participate fully on the project implementation. The local community and leadership have been very supportive and are doing their part by molding bricks, providing other materials like river sand, stones, collection of water, site clearance and labour.

In order to realize its goals, FOU has agreed to assist in mobilizing resources to build 8 classrooms. The construction cost will require USD 15,180. FOU main objective is to create community capacity to provide education and health infrastructure, and with a particular outreach to the most vulnerable in communities.

Project rationale

Developments do not come to these remote parts of Mlembule Maasai village easily. The major constraint for children and parents is that the most nearby primary schools are between the walking distances of 5 and 10 kms or 2 and 4 hours respectively. FOU’S has taken the initiative to change this situation and is now approaching organizations/ other stake holders in order to improve the conditions for children who are joining primary schools in the nearby villages.
The FoUs strategy is to construct a BLOCK consisting 8 classes for the primary School in Mlembule Maasai village for boys and girls respectively. Implementation will include construction, provision of teaching materials, such as text books for all subjects, and clean and safe drinking water and there will be two phases of the project and currently phase one of the project of construction a kindergarten classroom completed see the link click here
In phase (2) of the project, FOU’S will construct 7 classrooms which will have one door and seven windows each and will be 27 metres long and six metres wide. The walls and the floor will be made from locally baked bricks; the doors and windows of metal and the roof of asbestos sheets. There will also be need to construct staff houses comprising of head teachers, her deputy and a staff rooms, six toilets and two staff houses. Once construction work is completed, classrooms will be fitted with chairs in phase two of the project to prepare the school to start operating learning and teaching activities in early 2017. The classrooms will be used to teach the pupils in the morning and avoid hot sitting which inconveniences both school children and teachers. The FOU’S executive mobilized parents and local community members to make bricks for the buildings and contribute other locally available materials towards this project.

This project will also provide the community in appreciating the importance of sending their children to school. FOU’S being former head/ leader of this initiative should motivate the young boys and girls to emulate and believe that nothing is impossible if they work hard.

Problem Statement

In the communities of Northern Tanzania, there has been insufficient education efforts and institutional development for the Masai and villager living more interior to understand and benefit from educational achievement. Typically, these local people such as Masai children enter First Grade at age seven without prior exposure to classroom-based teaching, without basic skills, such as counting and writing, typical among other Tanzanian children, and without an understanding of Swahili, which is the medium for instructions. They are set up for failure from the beginning; not surprisingly, many drop-out before the end of Primary School, and almost half do not pass the Grade 7 exams, which are critical to entering Secondary School. Consequently, as compared to other communities throughout Tanzania, the Maasai have far less children succeeding at all levels in school

Statement of problem statement

The result is that the Masai are poorly represented in jobs of influence; for example there are relatively few Masai teaching in the local schools, and there are even fewer working in local health clinics or conducting social services. Masai are also under-represented in local governing bodies; many District levels positions related to land, livestock, natural resources, etc. are filled by non-Masai, who sometimes make decisions on behalf of the community with little knowledge about and/or prejudice against it!

It’s well-recognized that early education opportunities, such as pre-school, contribute to educational development and enhance school achievement later. If Masai children get pre-school opportunities where they can learn some Swahili, gain exposure to a classroom environment, and learn basic skills, they’ll be better prepared for Primary School, their families will be more supportive of formal education, and the children will stay in school longer and do better!

Fou Charity long goal

This proposal aims at rising the necessary funding to construct a pre-school, and increase the ongoing FoU Charity programme, to purpose built premises from where we will be able to assist more children by offering additional skills though training. This new pre-school will make a durable change to the lives of many children who are trapped by present circumstances and will be a sustainable long-term project

The objectives:

To construct one block for primary school for Maasai Primary school, Mlembule Mombo Tanzania with a population of about 1,000 primary school going children to provide quality education in seven years.

The project was proposed by a series of discussion with the local communities, review of baseline data, and also minutes of the FOU’S meetings.

Phase 1

Construction of 1 kindergarten classrooms is completed and now kids are in school leaning but 4 more classroom and staff houses will start as soon as funds are availed. This will be followed by construction of storage tanks for rainwater collection. At the end of the project, the last act will be the buying of desks as Government has provided almost all the essential text books.

Installation of a 5,000 litre borehole water collection plastic tank is at an advanced stage and purchase of desks will be done to enable the school to start operating in the second budget of phase two of the project. The school will admit 200 students over four classes

Deliverable

Secretary of FOU’S will deliver both technical and financial reports each month to the funding agency. This will include details of the class attendance by learners and teachers, lessons taught, materials purchased, challenges faced, achievements realized, money spent and the community support.

Project Beneficiaries

The school facilities aim to give services to 300 primary school students from Maasai and surrounding villages such as Mlembule,Songea, Kwemgogo, Kibaoni, Mbogoyola etc.

Monitoring and Evaluation

A variety of formal and informal Monitoring and Evaluation mechanisms will be central to ensuring the appropriate delivery of effective and sustainable services. These will include: Multi Indicator Cluster Surveys, class performance surveys, class attendance data, girl-boy retention data and exit surveys.

Project sustainability

FOU’S will continue to work with the local Council and Ministry of education on this capacity while also working closely with local NGOs working on education programmes in the area. FOU’S will develop a Memorandum of Understanding with the Ministry of Education which will clarify each partners’ roles and responsibilities both short and long term. The Ministry of education will be encouraged to provide staff for the facilities, facilitate the donor funders supported school supply and FOU’S will invest heavily in staff training at all levels. In this way sustainable structures for primary school education delivery will be developed in Masai village, Mlembule Masai village.

FOU’S will work with local communities to develop the capacity of individuals to play an active role in governance and delivery of education in primary school. Parents Teachers Association (PTA) will be formed to ensure the school’s future sustainability. FoUs annual sustainability assessment will be used to review the capacity of both local communities and school to take on further aspects of supporting the school after the donor phase. FOU will continue to provide its technical support and facilitation.

Collaboration

FOU’S will collaborate and network with the local community, community leaders, Development partners and Government of Tanzania

Community Contribution

The local Community will contribute labor and local materials such as water and sand that will be used to construct the four classrooms and provide security for the materials.

FOU’S Capacity

FOU has the required capacity necessary to design interventions and at the same time give impetus to the program’s management. The organization constantly plans before engaging in project activities and other interventions. It’s recognition by the local communities and School authorities have further placed us in a strategic footing to replicate ourselves in the affairs of the school. We have a policy of noninterference in the school administration and our role is to assist where possible. FOU has a rare unity of purpose amongst its members and the feeling of serving one’s former school bonds us further. This has in turn ensured solidarity and hence it’s stability. There is high potential that this achievement will be replicated in the community and Mlembule Maasai village district as a whole.

Our budget proposal is based on materials donated by Friends of Usambara own sources as well as personal cash donations by members of FOU’S. Each pupil has been levied $5.00 each and there is a budget deficit which FOU’S need to cover mostly for labour.