Tannen - Dec 14-15th

Yesterday and today was our Business Development Workshop, which we are leading for the first time. Attendees included all of our “STS Facilitators” who are the leaders in each of the clubs, a couple of “Club Parents” who are the liaison between the club and the school, and a small number of promising OVC Advocates. The workshop itself is primarily a path-finder for a 5 day workshop that we hope to host at the schools in 2011. The long term goal is to assist the clubs to become self-sufficient (decrease dependency on foreign support), and simultaneously provide the students in the clubs with practical skills for providing for themselves and their families in the future. We have observed through the years that many of the students who manage to pay for and complete their high school education struggle to find something to transition to when they graduate. College is not an option for most, and the high schools are not focused on providing them with a vocation or essential life skills. A small percentage of high school graduates are able to find jobs, and too many of them become idle. Our hope is that this program can help to span the gap between the reading-writing-arithmetic-type of education to something that can practically assist them with their lives upon graduation. In the same vein, we would like to encourage them to start businesses that result in a product that will provide for core community needs such as food and clothing. I had a conversation about the need to develop basic vocational skills and focus on providing the essentials for survival with one of my brothers before leaving for Zambia, and this conversation helped me to put these concepts at the forefront of my mind.

That’s probably enough philosophy for now, so back to the workshop… we kept the STS leaders and OVC advocates together yesterday morning. We started late due to late arrivals, but once we got going I enjoyed facilitating the morning and early afternoon activities. We covered some introductory materials, expectations, and brainstormed business ideas. These ideas were reduced to ones that had a reasonable capital investment and were determined to have the most benefit to student members and the community, and the greatest chance of success. Small groups formed and discussed which business would be the best fit for them. We started from a list of 50+ ideas, reduced to the top 8, and at the end everyone ended up choosing either farming for ground nuts or chicken rearing but I think that we learned something from the process and I do think those businesses fit the bill.

Megan was sick, but made it in around lunch time. She taught about “making money” – market strategy, minimizing expenditures, and risk management. Our late start & lunch time made it so that she had to compress her materials, but it was a nice overview which is in alignment with our objective for these two days. She impressed me with her ability to power through her sickness and coherently teach these subjects, engage the audience, and provide appropriate and thoughtful responses to their questions.

Today, Megan was even sicker than yesterday (we think as a response to the additional malaria meds that she took yesterday). We were all somewhat dehydrated since we ran out of clean water the night before, but she woke up very thirsty so I scavenged around the house and managed to find a few sips of clean water & some boiled water which Sarah had turned into lemonade the night before. Johnny had to make a run home a little later in the morning, so he brought her home some bread and purified water which was basically the only thing that she wanted.

At the workshop, we started off in the traditional way with some great music. Fena Chibesa, who hosted part of our team when we were in Dar Es Salaam last year, led us in Zambian & Tanzanian worship songs which I really enjoyed. Afterwards we split the OVC Advocates from the STS leaders for the rest of the day. Johnny taught those who had come in support of their OVCs. I didn't have the opportunity to hear what he was saying, but I know that he has a solid understanding of the needs of his group and a nice teaching style. He had made colorful poster boards with good content which he duct taped to the wall to reference in support of his message, and the couple of times that I passed by it seemed like his group was engaged and I got a verbal confirmation that “it went good” at the end of the day.

Megan didn’t end up making it out of the house, so I had the facilitators to myself for the day. One of our long-time STS-Zambia members, Terry, taught a session in the morning on business planning. I’m really glad that he used his education and experience in business to help us teach and I think that it added a lot. I have nothing but good things to say about his preparation, content, and presentation and it flowed well with the rest of the day. I mostly focused on the management of people and finances, the content of which had been prepared with the help of a state-side colleague. The emphasis was on starting a small business with their club, but we also discussed applicability to their clubs in general. Despite just getting over being sick and generally being somewhat fatigued, I found the day to be very enjoyable, interactive, and productive. I left with the feeling that we had accomplished something and the verbal and written comments from the facilitators and club parents confirmed this for me.

Back at the house, Sarah already had dinner going and we enjoyed our bucket baths since the day had been somewhat hot. Megan is still sick but has been sleeping and resting a lot and appears to be on the road to recovery. So don’t worry Megan’s Mom and Dad but please do continue to keep her in your prayers!

Chisuma mukwai,

Tannen VZ