Mission and Purpose

Mission and Purpose
Our mission at Child-Hope Zambia is to reduce poverty, HIV/AIDS and improve the living standards of rural children in Zambia. This is done through equipping the children and the parents with different skills and knowledge that will enable them contribute to their well being.

In order for us at Child-Hope to help the communities realize their dreams, the following needs are essential for the support of the children: Education, health, nutrition, security, protection and religious support. Child-Hope strives to realize the dreams and hopes for orphans and other vulnerable children in the rural communities.

However, we at Child-Hope Zambia can not do this alone as it needs concerted efforts from the donors, church ministries, well-wishers, individuals, companies, foundations etc. This will help the organization realize the dream of the children. Child-Hope has continued serving the rural children even in places that have never been reached before by other NGOs. So far, Child-Hope is the only organization that has direct programmes on children in this Chiefdom.

Our organization is really determined to continue restoring hope to the children who have lost it as a result of losing their parents.

Child-Hope has the following activities in trying to fulfill its objectives:

-Putting up buildings for Early Childhood Development Classes (Day Care Centers) through community participation shared among 15 villages. Under this, the community undergoes mobilization for community development training so as to support mobilization and local resource sourcing. However, these buildings are also used by the primary school going children in the afternoon because government rural schools do not have enough classroom blocks.

-Establishing Day Care Centers and Pre-Schools for young children and literacy classes for adults to improve their reading and writing skills.

-Child feeding programs to support and encourage orphans and other vulnerable children to attend school.

-Health support by making common drugs available to the children e.g. de-worming drugs, anti malaria ,anti bilharzias,panadol and aspirin.

-Income generating activities to improve the community capacity in supporting their children. Activities include mothers clubs who sew different children’s clothes, jerseys, uniforms and table clothes. Youth clubs undertaking piggery, goat rearing skills development activities and gardening. These Income generating activities ensure sustainability of the project.

-HIV/AIDS adolescent youth awareness and education program through peer education and moral upbringing to fight HIV/AIDS in the rural communities. Here, the organization also uses sports participation to disseminate information about HIV/AIDS. It uses sports like soccer, netball and volleyball. Villages compete against each other and the best teams get prizes. This encourages the communities to do more in HIV/AIDS activities. Child-Hope also uses drama, poems and songs to disseminate information about HIV/AIDS. Peer educators have been trained to handle most of the HIV/AIDS programs in the communities.

-Provision of food and medicines to the people living with HIV/AIDS. On the provision of medicines to the people living with HIV/AIDS, Child-Hope makes available: panadol, aspirin. ORS and procaine penicillin. These drugs suppress other diseases that may affect the bodies of the people living with HIV/AIDS due to weak anti bodies caused by HIV/AIDS.

-Home visits to the people living with HIV/AIDS through Child-Hope caregivers. The caregivers feed, wash and clean the homes of the people living with HIV/AIDS that do not have the energy to do this for themselves as a result of sickness. The caregivers also help in turning the bodies and applying medicine to the people living with HIV/AIDS that have developed sores due to over sleeping on one side.

-Gender training workshops for community members to support effective and gender sensitive development. This has helped the rural communities especially the women whose Rights were not considered before.

-Provision of food and nutritional security of the malnourished children directly or indirectly affected by HIV/AIDS.

-Provision of immediate nutritional support to the children identified as acutely malnourished through a monitored supplementary feeding program.

-Establishing communal gardens which increase the food and nutritional security of the malnourished children identified as stunted. 80% of the vegetables in the gardens are consumed by the children and 20% of the vegetables are being sold for the continuation of purchase of seed for gardening.

-Ongoing sponsorship of some children attending basic education

-Distribution of mosquito nets so as to reduce the high rates of malaria cases among the children.
-Provision of maize seed and fertilizer to the families that are hard to reach due to socio-economic situation in which they exist.

Education in Zambia

The education system in Zambia consists of 7 years of primary schooling and 5 years of secondary schooling before students can enter university, college, or other institutions of higher learning. The following is the breakdown:

Primary School:
* Grades one to seven.
Secondary School:
* Phase 1: grades eight and nine (also known as Junior Secondary)
* Phase 2: grades ten to twelve (also known as Upper Secondary)

The academic year in Zambia runs from January to December. It has three month school terms which are broken up by a roughly one month holiday prior to each term. This translates to about 40 weeks of school per year.

The minimum entrance age to the first year of primary school, known as Grade 1, is 7 years old. Thus a child is expected to enter his/her first year of high school (Form 1) at 14 years old. These were government established standards. Schools, particularly private schools, are very liberal in applying them. Their priority is largely on the performance of each child. It’s thus common to find children of varying age groups throughout the schooling years.

Primary languages: English as the language of instruction and one Zambian language assigned by each provincial district.

2011 Fifth Distribution Post 22: ECCDE Children Getting Educational Items

Cletiness 766 above and Lillian 832 below

Oliver 922 above and Prince 764 below

2011 Fifth Distribution Post 9: Early Learning Students Receiving Learning Books (January Sponsorships)

Peter 219 above and Ronah 803 below

Cacious 980 above (and it looks like he has moved on to primary school, according to his uniform) and Emmanuel 834 below

Raymond 934 above and Anita 986 below (who is wearing a primary uniform- is she in 1st grade now?)

Morris 997 above and Harriet 1003 below (Harriet looks so much like Chinyama 433 here- I think it is the way that she is looking at the camera that makes me think it)

Kasamba 953 above and Liness 1107 below

A Equals B

More with the Math Class

Several of you have asked that I provide the written words of what the teacher is saying. I will go back shortly to add to the previous videos. In this video, you will hear the math teacher teaching her class algebra. She says that "a equals b, and when a equals b, this is how we write it =". "Any questions?"

Teacher in Simwaba explaining hunger

The 5th grade math teacher in Simwaba is explaning how the children come to school hungry. 
She would like them to have access to more food, so that they can come to school with a full stomach and ready to learn.  As we get closer to the planting season, it will be important for these families to have access to seeds and fertilizer, so that they can provide for their children.  Even a bag of mealie meal helps the family a lot!

Math Class Teacher

About CHILDHOPE-ZAMBIA Part 2~ Head Start

Early Childhood Care, Development and Education (ECCDE):

Many children in the targeted districts benefit from CHILDHOPE-ZAMBIA early childhood care development and education (ECCDE) work through supporting their physical and emotional development. CHILDHOPE Initiatives include construction of early childhood care, development and education centers, establishing day care centers and pre-schools, stimulating children's learning through play, pre-school, feeding programmes, and adult literacy classes to improve their reading and writing skills. CHILDHOPE believes early childhood programmes make for strong foundations and pay high dividends which have significant impact on children's health and readiness to learn brings important economic returns later in life.

Improving performance at school:

For instance in Mazabuka, primary school teachers in the targeted communities have reported that children who enroll for the first class at primary-level after having attended CHILDHOPE ECCDE programme perform better academically, socially and emotionally than their classmates. CHILDHOPE ECCDE programmes have been most successful where strong relationships among the communities and the basic school teachers have been formed. Our basic school improvement work involves child participation and school governance.
In 2009, CHILDHOPE trained 40 pre-school teachers, 80 community members in TB Direct observed treatment(DOT) and psychosocial counseling, 120 women in safe motherhood and HIV/AIDS, 80 community members in ECCDE care giving, 80 community members in parent management committees, supported 240 people living with HIV/AIDS through the provision of Home based care kits. For example in 2009 in Mazabuka district, CHILDHOPE supported 800 children in ECCDE.

About CHILDHOPE-ZAMBIA Part 1~ Education

Every child deserves a better future!!

Founded 12 years ago, CHILDHOPE-ZAMBIA is one of the children’s development organizations in Zambia. We work in the Southern Province of Zambia in Mazabuka, Monze and Choma districts to alleviate poverty and promote child rights in order to raise them out of poverty. CHILDHOPE works with more than 3000 families and their communities in the targeted districts. We offer our help to the children who need it the most- those living in the rural areas of Zambia. The organization is independent, with no religious, political or governmental affiliations.

What we do:
CHILDHOPE`s work to reduce poverty, HIV/AIDS, improve the living standards of children and promoting child rights in order to raise them out of poverty is based around 6 core areas (one of which we will discuss now):

Education
CHILDHOPE believes that education is crucial for development and one of the most powerful tools in breaking the poverty cycle.
CHILDHOPE puts in more in education than any other programme area and works to ensure that children, young people and adults get the knowledge and life skills they need to realize their full potential. The school improvement programme, which is part of our formal education work, delivers:
• Support to every aspect of a school essential in creating the best learning environment for children there by providing adequate and appropriate teaching and learning materials for the basic school children.
• Supporting education through the provision of school furniture.
• Child representation on every school committee and training of school management committees which are tailored towards making schools more transparent. As parents and children realize that they are key stakeholders in the running of schools, they will begin to take decision-making seriously and begin to demand explanations on the way their schools are run.

Tune in tomorrow for the continuum...

2011 First Distribution Post #19: Community Thank You

Translation courtesy of Mr. Chim Mvula:
The lady in the video was thanking CHILDHOPE staff and the sponsors for the work they were doing for the children. She said the fruits of development are showing in communities. She went on to say that as communities, they are grateful for the support rendered to the children. She is proudly saying that this is the work communities are doing together with CHILDHOPE. She encouraged the parents to take their children to school so that they could become better citizens. She told the parents not to hide the children in their homes but take them to school in order for them to break out of poverty.
(I love the children's joyful noises at the end)

The ECCDE Program

859 above and 754 below

748 above and 851 below

821 below

Aren't these little ones just precious!!?? We now have approximately 200 preschool children available for sponsorship. Now, here is why this program is so important and why you should consider sponsoring one of these little ones:

In Zambia, children do not begin school until the age of 7! For those of you with children of your own, you have probably seen just how much a child can learn BEFORE the age of 7. Children are like sponges and soak up everything they can even repeating what they have learned. It is extremely important to teach language at this time. Learning a new language before the age of 7 means that the child will grow up speaking the language normally with little or no foreign accent.

While other children in Zambia are hanging out all day waiting to turn 7, the children in Mazabuka are able to attend school!! At the CHILDHOPE supported preschool centers, they learn English, beginning math, beginning reading, educational play, and much more!

The sponsorship program provides the individual child with shoes, medicines, school supplies, and school books. The program provides the classroom with learning materials such as educational toys, wall charts, and books!

I have posted some of these children already on the preschool child pages, but I have another 125 children I will be posting this week. Let's help these children move to the head of their class and become the future leaders of Zambia!!

Educating the Community about HIV/AIDS

One of the programs that Child Hope Zambia is passionate about is educating the people about HIV/AIDS. There are so many misconceptions and traditions that have got to be cleared up in order to stop the spread of the disease. Remember, these are people who are comfortable in traditions and doing what has always been done generation after generation. Change is difficult, so it is mini-seminars like these that Child Hope provides that give the information that the people need.

Close to 20% of Zambians are HIV+. It used to be said that because of the closeness of the Zambian families, orphans did not exist. If a child lost their parents, they would just be absorbed into the larger family group and be taken care of. This can not be said any more. There are so many children left without parents that there are children now raising themselves.

Something has got to be done to bring down the number of people contracting HIV- It can only be done through education. If the people could understand and truly believe what they are being taught by Child Hope about HIV/AIDS, there would be no more new cases of HIV infection.

Here are some of the hurdles that Child Hope faces and what they need to educate the people about:

1. For those already infected, they do not want to get treatment. Some times, what has happened in the passed is that they have seen others with AIDS go to the clinic only after they are close to death. These people were given ARV's (the treatment that can give miraculous results if given early enough). After getting the ARV's the people did not get better and actually got much worse. This is because they waited too long to get treatment. Those that think they are HIV+ are looking at those who got sicker and saying that the ARV's are actually poison. Therefore, the newly infected will not get treatment.

2. The women have it especially hard. The women may be aware that their husband is not being faithful, but they are not allowed to refuse their husband's sexual advances nor can they request a condom. This is the culture, and Child Hope is trying to fight for women's rights as well.

3. One tradition that has been around forever and is exacerbating the spread of HIV is the cleansing of the woman after her husband's death. It seems ridiculous that this could even happen from the stand point of what the rest of us know because it seems like common sense to us. Remember these are traditions that have been around forever and the people truly believe in them. For the cleansing, this is what happens- The husband dies and leaves the wife alone. It is the responsibility of the husband's male family members to cleanse her. One male member must go and have intercourse with the wife to cleanse her. If the husband died of AIDS, chances are pretty great that the wife is HIV+, which could be then passed to the male member of the family that had intercourse with her. If the wife does not have HIV, she may get it from the male member that has intercourse with her as many times the family's will use the same male member to perform this tradition every time. As you can imagine, this practice could wipe out an entire family, or even an entire village!!

Child Hope Zambia travels to the communities and educates the families about how HIV is transmitted in an effort to stop the spread. Above you can see pictures of the fun ways they educate them.