United for Action August-September Report

14 March 2016
group photo

INTRODUCTION

United For Action (UFA) is based in Kasungu district in central Malawi, 127 km north of Lilongwe, as we go to Mzuzu. The Cooperation Circle applied for membership in the URI family and was approved in September 2015. The group started with seven members. Now it has increased to 10 members and we are expecting to grow bigger.

VISION

To have a peaceful and just world.

MISSION

To promote the development and education of a young child as we economically empower disadvantaged youth while ensuring that women’s rights are protected.

OBJECTIVES

To promote the education of children in Malawi.

To build the capacity of youth so that they become economically independent.

To promote the protection of women’s rights, with a focus on economic independence.

holding papers

OUR TARGET GROUPS

1. CHILDREN

  • In this group, United for Action CC is targeting children under the age of 18 years who are both in school and out of school.

2. YOUTH

  • The CC is also targeting the youth who are much vulnerable to abuse by different sectors of the society due to high rates of unemployment.
  • Young pregnant women will be brought back to school after giving birth, if they are willing to do so.

3. WOMEN

  • Women are subjected to different types of injustices. Women will therefore be empowered economically in order to build their capacity to become self-reliant.
woman holding on a paper

MAIN FOCUS

Our main focus of our CC is to mobilize the children to stay in school, so the CC members have carried out the following activities:

CONDUCTED FOCUS GROUP DISCUSSION

The CC has conducted focus group discussion in the communities around Tchapa primary school to find out the reason why there is a high drop-out rate of learners and early pregnancies. We came up with the following reasons:

  • Lack of seriousness on the part of parents to send back the children to school.
  • The local leaders do not have much influence when it comes to talking with the communities to send back the children to school.
  • Lack of parental support to provide learning materials to the learners.
  • Lack of school uniform and development funds to some learners.
  • Early pregnancies on the part of girls due to lack of youth activities which can make them busy instead of indulging in immoral behaviors.

How UFA has addressed the above listed challenges in relation to:                                                                                                     

1. Children and Youth

  • Conducted the Back to School Campaign, which first targeted all the local leaders around Tchapa primary school. This was through the drama performed by our youth club named Tiyende.
  • Pamodzi Girls (Let’s Move Together, Girls) and also the speeches from other people invited.
  • Conducted community education session to address the issues which came out during the focus group discussion.
  • Started one youth club around Tchapa primary school community.
  • The CC has bought a net ball for the youth clubs to make them busy instead of involving themselves in immoral behaviors.
  • Continue empowering the girls on hand sewing.
  • Distributed learning materials to the learners of Tchapa primary school. The CC has distributed 150 notebooks and 100 pens to the learners of Tchapa primary school.

2. Women Empowerment

  • The CC has also mobilized three women who stopped going to school in 1995 in std 8. Now they are leaving their family in homes and going back to school. This is one of the great achievements which our CC has done.
  • The CC has conducted meetings with the Village Loan saving groups to see the progress and the challenges they are encountering.
giving out paper

CHALLENGES

  • Lack of enough resources to establish more youth clubs as we promised the community when we were conducting back to school campaign.
  • High number of disadvantaged children who need more support on learning materials and school uniform from the well wishers
childern playing in the yard

WAY FORWARD

The CC should organize the fundraising activities to raise funds to support the needy learners.

The CC should develop small proposals to find some funds to run its CC.

a child holding on a shirt

APPRECIATION

The group members would like to send a great appreciation to URI for recognizing our CC and approving it within a short period of time.

Below are some of the photos taken from the various activities that the CC has been involved with during August and September 2015.

(NOTE: The camera’s date was not reset, hence the dates showing on the photos are reflecting the last time when the camera was used.)