Our Cateress hard at work
On Friday I have scheduled a meeting with a gentleman from the Kenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI) to discuss the sustainability and operational costs of buying a cow for Daisy. He should be very knowledgeable and be able to answer many of the questions that I have. Since I am not a farmer myself, I have numerous questions that come up daily as I plan out the project.
Yesterday, I held a staff meeting with the Deputy, teacher in charge of gardening, accounts clerk, and Daisy’s FSD coordinator to go over the overall goal of my program. I wanted them to start thinking about being “owners” of the proposed programs. Without their investment in the program, it will fail. They reassured me that they back me 100% and will not let this program fail because they understand the benefits of it to the school. I was very happy to hear this. I will follow up with them next week to see what type of ideas they have generated about accountability, sustainability, and ownership. The head teacher is out this week, so it will be nice to have something to share with him upon his return.
We are hoping to purchase materials for the garden either Friday, or earlier next week with my seed grant money.
We will have our second meeting with the children tomorrow (it was cancelled due to rains yesterday). I will let you know how it goes. On the agenda is choosing 2 representatives for each class, as well as teaching everyone the attention that it will take to start a garden. We are hoping the rains will hold off so that they will have a chance to ‘weed’ some of the land.
Looks like you're making great progress- I'm sure that if Daisy can integrate the cow into their curriculum, they'll have more success raising it than they did the last time around, and its contribution to their capacities will be incredible. Thanks for the pictures, thanks for picking up where the SLT left off, and give my best to everyone at Daisy and FSD. I miss them.
ReplyDeleteBest of luck,
Stephen Carey