Solar Powered Students

This week my students have started to pay for and pick up their solar lights.  After weeks of asking me when they would get them and being told "It's coming," a typical Ghanaian response, they are very excited to begin using their lights to study at night.  Today I taught them a lesson on goal making and gave them a writing assignment telling me one short term and long term goal.  After all, it's important to have goals in mind for the future and an action plan to achieve them (note to self: practice what you preach).  A big thanks from my students and me to the donors who made this project possible! 

Peer Education Finale (Part 2: The Bad)

Too often as an optimist I tend focus on the positives and want to quickly forget the negatives.  But it’s important to learn and grow from challenges we face which is why I want to share some of the difficulties I encountered with the peer education finale.  First off the day before the program my counterpart Joe (see the photo of the two of us in our awesome polos) found out he had to go to Fumbisi for an interview to help with voting in the upcoming election.  He didn’t really have a choice so I had to make do without him.  We decided I’d cover one of the sessions he was planning to do in the morning and then have him do another session in the afternoon since he’d be back by then.  He did return in time to take lunch with us as well as help with the afternoon so it was all good.

The main problem I had was around a guest speaker I had invited to talk to my students.  I met the guy by contacting him using information from a list of support groups for PLWHA that Peace Corps gave me.  In July I went to their support group meeting in the next village over and discussed with him about coming to talk to my students.  He was receptive to the idea and we’ve kept in touch since them.  I scheduled him to come a while ago once we selected the date and we talked up until a couple of days before the program when he was working to repair his moto so he could come.  The night before and morning of the program I couldn’t get in touch with him but finally he called me around noon.  He told me he was out our station and I should come get him which I couldn’t do since I was with my students.   I asked him to come to our primary school but he kept calling and repeating himself.  Long story short I was walking with two of my girls to go check on our food (which was running late) when I called him again since he hadn’t shown up and one of my girls spotted him.  I sent her to him and when she returned she told me “Madam, he is boozed.  He is so drunk he almost fell over.”  I sent the girls to check on the food while I went to talk to him.  Indeed he was completely drunk and somewhat belligerent since it took me so long to come.  Unfortunately nobody (like the headmaster, my counterpart Joseph, or go to guy Chris) was around to help me handle the situation.  The man was ready to go to speak to my students.  I ended up telling him the program wasn’t coming on today and apologizing profusely but still offered to pay him for his fuel to come and go.  Understandably I was super stressed by this point.  But I ran to my house to pick the money and bring it to him.  Later I found out he went to someone’s house to sleep the alcohol off and didn’t leave our village until the next day- I was glad he didn’t try to drive home.  I’m just thankful he wasn’t able to find his way to the primary school and show up in that state to ‘talk’ to my students.  That scene could’ve possibly been even more unpleasant.  This is the second time since I’ve been here that a resource person has shown up to talk to my students drunk.  It’s really sad how rampant alcoholism is here.  I’ve learned from this that I need to be very careful who I invite to talk to my students.  Also I would caution other volunteers to make sure you know the person very well.  My mistake was thinking a single meeting allowed me to truly assess someone. 

The last challenge was just around organizing the food vendor and the lateness of the food.  First when we planned the menu I thought that’s all I’d have to do.  But instead I had to meet with Madam Agie to write down all the ingredients and the amount she’d need to buy so I could give her the exact amount to go buy at market.  Then that morning I had to go to our little market to pick out the fowls to buy amidst trying to setup everything at the primary school.  Of course our food was late coming- we scheduled lunch for noon but the food wasn’t ready until 1:30pm.  Thankfully after so long in Ghana I know how things work and am much more flexible.  I had some role play games and films to keep the students busy and not thinking about their hunger.  In the end, the food was pretty amazing so it worked out.  And all in all the program was successful- the students learned a lot and also had fun! 

Peer Education Finale (Part 1: The Good)

It’s been a long time coming but we finally held our Peer Educators finale (as I called it) on Saturday.  First a little background information.  Starting in the second term, the assistant health teacher Joseph and I started a peer educators training program focusing on educating and sensitizing the students on HIV/AIDS.  Since the beginning, we've met with the 12 selected form 1 and form 2 students on topics including basic facts on STIs and HIV/AIDS, decision making, saying no, and assertiveness.  For a while we’d been planning to hold a one-day program finale in order to complete the program successfully and swear in the peer educators.  It took a while for the small grant I wrote to come through and the PEPFAR (President’s Emergency Relief for AIDS Relief) funds to be available.  The goal of the program was to equip our students to be effective as peer educators to educate, demonstrate, and sensitize their peers on HIV/AIDS and other issues.  We hoped at the end of our program the students would walk away with additional knowledge and skills regarding HIV/AIDS education and the confidence to share their knowledge with their peers through discussions, games, role plays, and condom demonstrations.

Now I’ll start with the actual program and right now I’ll focus on what went well and save the difficulties for another day.  The day before the program I gathered the 12 students (6 boys and 6 girls) together to discuss when they should be where wearing what and all that.  At the time, my student Michael (who wrote me the best teacher letter and went to camp with me) wasn’t sure if he’d be able to come since his parents wanted him to go to market the next day. So I was very thankful on Saturday when all 12 students showed up.  We started out by briefly reviewing what a peer educator is and what will be expected of them when the program is finished).  Then we played a team true/false game to revise basic facts on HIV/AIDS with toffee (candy) won by all- 2 pieces to the winners, 1 piece to the losers.  One thing that was important to me while planning the program was to make it as fun and interactive as possible- I didn’t want it to be another school day for them.  Also I wanted to reward their hard work during all of our trainings last school year.  Next we took a snack break and enjoyed biscuits (crackers) and cold water during which I showed them films about condom use to preface the nurse’s demonstration.  My friend Joel (or Nurse Joel as he’s stored in my phone) came to do the condom demonstration and did a great job.  I was happy to have someone from the clinic come and take part of the program.  After the demonstration, I took the students outside to play the condom time bomb game like we did at camp.  They enjoyed laughing at each other try to burst the ‘balloon,’ answering questions to review what was just learned, and dancing to Ghanaian music on my iPod I blasted from the tiny yet effective speakers I have here.  While waiting for lunch, I had some pick and act scenarios on assertiveness, saying no, and negotiation for the more dramatic students to act out for us.  I’d tried this before in groups of two but they’d mostly get up front and giggle so this time it went much better and I think some felt more comfortable doing it individually.  Our lunch of jollof rice (spicy tomato based rice) with fowl meat was delicious and plentiful.  The students loved going back for seconds!

In the afternoon, we did the Loss Exercise from the handy dandy Peace Corps Life Skills manual.  Joseph took the students through the handout where they wrote down answers to questions about their favorite item, body part, activity, and person in addition to a secret nobody or only one person knows about them.  During this part they were rather silly sharing that they put down their brain or their penis (due to the condom demo) or whatnot.  Then we got to the more serious part where we walked them through imagining that they lost each thing they listed.  Next we talked about how they would feel if this were actually true.  It was a little difficult getting them to pretend but most of them got it in the end and listed emotions including feeling sad, bad, like they wanted to kill themselves, alone, abandoned, angry, etc.  Then we discussed how this could relate to someone testing positive for HIV and how they would feel if they or someone they knew were in this situation.  It was pretty powerful to see them process the exercise and put themselves in someone else’s shoes, practicing empathy and compassion.  Last I had them tell me how they would treat someone who was experiencing this.  It was really encouraging to hear responses like I want to help them, support them, and make them happy (when I asked for specifics, the boy said he’d have a party) instead of previous mentality of we should lock them up, kill them, etc.  We also talked about the importance of support groups for PLWHA.  Afterward we took a short break to prepare for the closing ceremony. 

During the closing ceremony, we called the students up one by one to receive a certificate of completion and lollipops from me and a Peer Educator shirt from Joseph.  I had red polo shirts made in Bolga with the HIV ribbon and the name of our school on the front and the names of all the peer educators listed on the back and the quotation “A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle.”  We celebrated by drinking minerals (Coke, Sprite, Fanta), snapping a plethora of photos, and having a short dance party.  I also convinced the students to lay down on the classroom floor to attempt to make the red ribbon with our bodies.  I got the idea from somewhere and wanted to try it.  See the photo below and tell me if you can make out the ribbon.  All in all the day went really well!  Before the program, I wanted the condom demonstration/game and loss exercise to go smoothly and be impactful.  I think they were highly successfully in educating the students on prevention and sensitizing them on stigma reduction.  I’ll post again soon on challenges of putting on the training event. 

During the Loss Exercise, my student Michael that I mentioned before asked if he could put down our peer education training as his favorite activity.  Then once we went through the step by step of losing everything they wrote down he exclaimed ‘O madam- I lost you.’ Early on the training while we were discussing their role as peer educators I asked them if they had ideas on how to best educate their peers or the community.  I gave them ideas like doing a quiz game or a film show but at the time they didn’t have anything.  But by the end of it one boy mentioned how he’d like to setup a meeting in their respective area (they live in different sections or parts of the village) and a girl had the idea for them to put on a drama.  Yesterday during one of the breaks in our school day, I noticed all my peer educators convening under the tree in front of my house.  I asked if they needed something but they said no.  Later on I called Michael over to ask what they were up to and he told me that they’re trying to better plan the drama then come to me when they have a solid idea.  Today I used some of the girl peer educators to help with our Girls Club meeting where we played the transmission and risk game.  Then Linda did the condom demo while I talked about it and answered questions and we ended with the condom time bomb (again).  It’s really exciting to see the fruits of my labor!

Solar Lights for Students

I'm doing a project with some of my students to subsidize the cost of Unite to Light solar lights for them.  I was introduced to Unite to Light by a PCV I stayed with during training.  It's a non profit dedicated to providing low cost lighting to those without electricity in order to improve their quality of life and education by allowing children the opportunity to study in the evening. Check out a video made by the now  RPCV while he was still in his village to learn more.

Thanks to a generous donation by a group of RPCVS called Friends of Ghana our project only needs $100 more to be fully funded.  Each solar light costs less than $10 but will go along way to help my students furtheir their education in order to achieve their dreams and goals.  The summary below is what I wrote for the Peace Corps Partnership Program (PCPP) grant hoping it would compel people to donate:
As a junior high school teacher in Ghana, I have never heard the "My dog ate my homework" excuse, but I have heard "Madam, I couldn't do my homework because we don't have lights." I teach in a rural village in the impoverished Upper East region, with limited access to electricity. After school, students are expected to do many chores at home so find it difficult to find the time to complete their school assignments before night falls. Studies show that inadequate access to electricity directly correlates to illiteracy, poverty and health problems. This project hopes to alleviate this problem for students who aspire to become the future doctors, teachers, and lawyers of Ghana, by providing them with a solar light solution. This project targets 45 students mostly in our form 3 class because next year they will take the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE). This exam determines if they complete Junior High School and are placed at a Senior High School where they can further their education. In order to master the material they are taught in school and pass the BECE, they need to read, study, and do homework. Parents of students will be expected to make cost share contributions, in order to feel ownership of their solar light. These contributions account for 25 percent of the total project costs. The PCV will collect funds from parents of students before distributing the solar lights. Funds raised from this Peace Corps Partnership Program will subsidize the cost of the solar lights to these students who otherwise cannot afford them.

Quilt Square #2

Here's the narrative I wrote to submit along with the panel: The design for this block is the logo for the Sherigu-Yeobisi Agroforestry and Healthcare Organization (SAHO). Their slogan is together we can reach our goals. It was started in 2008 aimed educating and financing/employing women's groups but in recent years there's been more emphasis on health. Under the organization’s umbrella, UER PCV Emmaline Repp, who has now extended for a third year to work in Takoradi, started a support group with her dedicated counterpart Joe during her service to give members a place to just 'be’ and also to do education programs with them. After meeting for 9 months straight with 40-50 members attending every meeting, showing their dedication and cohesion, the group wrote a grant to create an office. The idea is to make the office a leading voice in local health education, including HIV/AIDS and anti-stigma and discrimination education. The office also gives group members loans for income generating activities using money raised through a canopy and chair business. We decided to create this panel to honor the hard work and dedication of Emma and Joe to improve the lives of the members and also give kudos to the members themselves.

Bolga Basket

After three days of teaching last week, I was on the move again. I travelled to Bolga for our volunteer’s meeting. Additionally we had arts and crafts time before our meeting in order to make quilt panels. Peace Corps Ghana is making quilt about HIV awareness, stigma reduction, and honoring those who are living with HIV or died from AIDS to be shown at a World AIDS Day (coming up December 1) event in Accra. Each region has been working to construct 2 panels for the quilt. As the Upper East region representative for the Ghana AIDS Project (or GhAP) committee, I received a goody bag full of materials including clothe, needles, thread, scissors, paint, and beads. I made sure to take lots of photos to document the creation of our panels which will be part of a presentation of photos and videos from all the regions about the idea and panel creation process at the event. We had one panel nailed down as the logo of an organization one of our volunteers helped lead a support group with. I’ll blog about that one more soon. It took us a while to come up with another idea but we knew we wanted it to show the spirit of the Upper East. We brainstormed crocodiles, mud huts, baobab trees and then finally settled on a basket. Bolga baskets are famous for being very colorful; ours is red, green, yellow (Ghana flag colors) and blue. Our newest volunteer, a high school art teacher from Georgia, sketched the basket then our dear education art volunteer Lauren cut the parts of the basket. Then it truly was a team effort sewing the basket together on the square! We added red HIV ribbons to the basket for HIV awareness and to show our support for stigma reduction. To complete both panels, we stayed up until midnight which was way past our bedtime here! But they both turned our really well and we’re proud of our creations. Plus if it was a competition (it’s not) we feel confident we’d win.