|
GRASSUP NOW (Grassroots Underpinnings: Poverty,
Nutrition, ODL/ICTs and Women consists of
four Kenyan based non-profits. Their goal is to promote
an educational program that is focused on local empowerment,
nutrition and health, open learning and sustainable
development.
These groups by working together collaboratively
were able to receive a grant proposal for 20,000 Canadian
dollars from the Commonwealth of Learning
(COL). COL is a Canadian organization that focuses
on developing programs that can be augmented with
ICT to address the needs of underserved communities.
The money was distributed evenly between the four
groups and was earmarked for the purchase of computers
and other related hardware to create Information
Communication Technology (ICT) Education Centers
as part of a process to spread the vision and mission
of the GRASSUP NOW program.
The leaders participating in GRASSUP NOW include,
James Onyango, Director of KAIPPG,
Francis Anyona of the Ikonzo Musanda Self-Help
Group, Kennedy Edwine Onyango, Director of
Community Initiatives and Social Support Center
Organization (CISSO) and OVF Kenya
and Kiragu Maina Coordinator of the Interactive
Learning Network Ltd (SchoolConnect). Janet
Friedman of KAIPPG International
helped to facilitate the process of bringing together
these groups, inviting them into the process of applying
for the grant with COL. Krisha Alluri of COL, has
played an important role as an advisor, helping to
guide and navigate this collaborative process of developing
a grant proposal suitable to COL. Mark Roest of oneVillage
Foundation USA also played an important
role in helping move the group forward in the process.
This working group persisted in cobbling together
drafts of the grant proposal, until they were able
to negotiate and revise one final version that they
collectively agreed would be submitted to the Commonwealth
Of Learning.
GRASSUP NOW's mission is
to develop materials which can be shared by all members
for mutual community benefit. GRASSUP NOW assists
underserved communities in Africa by raising money
to develop an ICT infrastructure that addresses the
socioeconomic roots of dependency thinking.
Important to this process is the bridging
of cultural, tribal, racial, gender and religious
barriers to create an open environment for learning.
To create an open learning environment, a leadership
model needs to emerge that is focused on coordinating
knowledge sharing and training towards the empowerment
of people, particularly women as it is that many women
and minority groups are discouraged from getting an
formal education. An important objective of this program
is to address social issues that promote the spread
of AIDS. Women are empowered to protect themselves
from HIV/AIDS by earning their own living. This addresses
one of the greatest causes of infection among poor
single women - relying on transient, but relatively
well-paid men to support them.
GRASSSUP NOW seeks to instill a self-help/social
enterprise approach that gives people a sense of achievement
and validation. This is done by providing local people
with the tools and information so that they can develop
a sense of what is the best way to build and organize
their local economies. Towards this end, this initiative,
creates and distributes educational content that serves
underserved communities in areas of:
| 1. |
Agriculture, nutrition
and health care |
| 2. |
Income-generation through business
education and e-commerce |
| 3. |
Environmental education |
| 4. |
Grass-roots empowerment through
literacy using ICT to augment existing teaching
and communication tools |
The GRASSUP ICT Educational Program supports ICT-enabled
local ODL content development and access:
| • |
Identify appropriate
and readily available information and communication
technology (ICT) and open and distance learning
(ODL) methods to support locally-produced educational
content creation. |
| • |
Integrate the best functionality
in ICT and ODL systems and capabilities provided
by leading innovators. |
| • |
Support the poverty reduction
and sustainable human development goals of the
COL-Kenya GRASSUP-NOW initiative |
ICT and organizational initiatives can be the drivers
of social transformation ensuring equal participation
in civil society government for minority groups and
basic welfare and safety net services such as health
care education, healthy nutritious food and safe drinking
water. This process of collaboration is at its root
about learning from the collective wisdom that defines
us as a living and evolving human global community.
GRASSUP (NOW) is a successful demonstration of how
committed people can overcome the challenges of collaboration.
|