Literacy/Education Development Interview Template
The Schools Project
I had the pleasure to sit with Ms. Helena Skembar, the National Representative for Concern Universal, a small NGO based out of Maputo, with its head offices located in the U.K. Concern Universal is working in community development in the Niassa Province of Mozambique's north. While I will not have the personal opportunity to visit any of their development sites in Niassa, it was very interesting to sit and talk with Helena both about Concern's programs in the country,and the overall situation with primary and secondary education in the country.
Looking at the literacy numbers in Mozambique, one is stuck by the magnitude of the peoblem. Is this a winnable issue? Is universal literacy in Mozambique a feasible possibility?
It is a great challenge that is facing this country. The biggest challenge comes in the quality of the educational system in the nation-simply put, the quality is very low. The national government always likes to impress the donors with their figures and statistics of improvement, but the realities on the ground are very different than the numbers put forward by the government of Mozambique. The statistics might match, but the actual quality of the education being offered to the students in the country is extremely low. The delivery is what is lacking. (How is Concern working to combat the lack of quality, if this is the biggest issue being faced?) We are involved in the training of community based literacy facilitators-we are literally helping in the training of the trainers, who can then turn around and work with the teachers, with a big emphasis on the follow up, which is most critical.
What groups are being specifically targeted by your programs here in Mozambique? How?
The focus of our efforts in the country now is in very rural communities in Niassa province. We are working with adult illiterate populations, and specifically women, who have been extremely disadvantaged in this area of literacy. Our facilitators need to be women as well, which is an important link to working with the female populations of Niassa. (Has this caused any resentment towards the women in charge of the programs by the local men?) In the beginning, there was some resentment by the men, but the women are the main participants in all the programs, and they are the ones who are receiving most of the benefit. Historically, in the rural areas of the country, from the age of 11 years old girls are taken out of school for traditional initiation rites and never brought back into formal a formal education setting; this leads to very high drop out rates for women in the north, and is a main reason or our work.
Many of the citizens of the country, particularly in outlying areas, are not speaking the national tongue of Portuguese; how are efforts being made to support local language literacy as well as second language literacy?
Mozambique is different than other countries in the region, because Portuguese, despite not being universal here, is still stronger, than, say, English in Malawi. The language might not be universal here, but it still unifies the country, despite the fact that it is still not understood in all areas. All the materials used in our training programs are done in Portuguese as well as in local languages. If someone can read in local language however, , they tend to be able to read in Portuguese as well. Even the national school curriculum has been designed with this dual language approach and all materials are produced in the country's different tongues. (Where are these multi-lingual resources being produced?) Most reading materials are coming from the government printers, but there are also private producers out in the remoter regions working with local production.
Teachers play an absolutely crucial role in this area. How are teachers motivated in their work when there is such a lack of funding for their salaries and for even the most basic educational resources? How does this affect the educational process in the country?
This is a huge issue for the country. In regards to the quality of the teachers, another huge problem is with abuse of girls in the schools, which also perpetuates AIDS in the country. This is a very common problem here and is often the motivation for male teachers to start their work. There are many rural schools that are boarding school where 80% of the girls are pregnant by the professors!
Who are the most essential partners that you work with in the local setting?
We have many local partners here in Mozambique, both here in Maputo and specifically in Niassa where our education programs are being conducted. We are currently working with the Christian Council of Mozambique, The Farmers Union, and the Association of People Living with HIV. The organization believes in a holistic approach, utilizing many local partners to collaborate and strengthen our work. We also work with Phonology, which is a local coalition in Niassa Province.
What resources are currently most needed by both your organization and by the schools system in Mozambique overall?
For now, most of the large donors in the country do not directly support education; this is something that needs to be done by the government, the actual providing of services to children. NGO's here are more the advocates, the ones who look at the budgets and work to support the budgets of the education ministry. The critical issue now with the budgets is that there is limited funding for literacy programs within the larger scope of the national budget. Outside organizations want to support the government in order to help them to do things better, but the country is very big and donor trends cannot lead to actual service delivery; ie: there are certain things, suich as the actual delivery of education to students, that should not be done by the NGO's but by the government.
