Teachers' capacities improvement

The outbreak of corona virus in Nigeria in late March 2021, led to closure of all learning institutions, thus affecting the schooling of boys and girls. crisis-affected boys and girls in North East Nigeria, and Cameroonian refugees in Cross-river states  are mostly affected by the schools closure. girls and young women refugees are mostly affected by the schools closure as 65% of them are exposed to unwanted pregnancies, early marriages and negative coping mechanisms as a result of lack of positive livelihood opportunities; while teachers have limited ICT skills , effective pedagogy, psycho-social support as well as capacities to prevent and respond to Covid-19  including PPE. So, is this program providing teachers with quality ICT skills and innovative  pedagogical  teaching techniques to  facilitate catch up community based radio  to maintain learning habits and build resilience of refugees  girls and young women in Cross-river state, Nigeria.

Schools closure urged Governments to adapt their curricula to alternate learning so as to catch up  with curriculum timelines and maintain learning habits of boys and girls. In this respect, Nigeria Federal ministry of education in conjunction with Unicef developed package of optional learning programs, such as radios and TV broadcasting programs; yet under-served and marginalized learners ( Cameroonian refugees) of poor households with limited resources could not afford for data nor internet devices. In addition, limited radio signals coverage in rural areas limited access to programs  as well as  monitoring attendance.Limited access to  electricity supply in rural areas widened  digital  gaps  in access to catch up learning between children of urban areas and those of rural ones. Furthermore, 65% of teachers in rural areas of Cross-rivers lack basic functional capacities in effective pedagogy, Psycho-social support and basic functional ICT skills to facilitate catch up learning programs such as in-persons  radios programs .In addition, 50% of assessed teachers in the targeted local Government Areas reported limited  access to teaching materials including tablets, lap top among others. So, will " community-based radio program  build back the linkages in inclusive  access to  quality education through teachers capacity building.

Teachers' capacities improvement is a solution that aims at improving teachers' capacities The solution will first assess teachers needs including teaching  approaches, then households with schooling girls, boys including young women with schooling needs ;who were negatively affected by covid-19. Then teachers who were affected by Covid-19 with limited  new teaching capacities will be provided with teaching materials including tablets, USB flashes for individual remote capacity building. The developed remedial teaching will be uploaded into tablets for capacity building on effective pedagogy, Teaching at the right level (TARL), covid-19 prevention and response and ICT functional skills, sexual  exploitation and abuse ( PSEA). Acquisition of remote new teaching pedagogical techniques will enable teachers to facilitate community-based radio learning programs to boys and girls including ICT skills to advert girls and young women negative livelihoods opportunities, unwanted pregnancies, early marriages as well as gender-based violence.

This program targets community-based teachers , boys and girls of  secondary schools of rural local Governments areas with teaching and learning needs who were impacted by both school closure and gender-based violence. African Humanitarian Aid International(AHAI) Meal Manager will carry  out a gender-sensitive needs assessment in  both schools and households to assess teachers' capacity building needs as well as those of learners. According to Joint Needs Assessment carried out by the education  sector in October 2020 in North East and Cross-river  55% of teachers in rural areas  have limited capacities  in ICT skills, 20% of teachers were reported with limited capacities in effective pedagogy while 50% were reported with emotional issues as a result of school closure. Furthermore, the program will target under-served and marginalized  poor refugees  households of host communities with schooling boys and girls with learning needs.  As the matter of fact, Cameroonian refugees are under-served and marginalized as they are not part of Nigeria HRP thus have limited access humanitarian assistance. The outbreak of COVID-19 has exacerbated the gaps in access to services including education. To meet the needs of target beneficiaries, the program will include the beneficiaries from the need assessment, design , program development, implementation as well as monitoring and evaluation. In fact, the program has an in-built mechanism to track beneficiaries perception through display of  free- hotlines and suggestion boxes placed in secured areas of  the program. In addition, the Meal manager including education stakeholders and African Humanitarian Aid International management Team will carry out  joint quarterly monitoring  visits to track teachers performance and learners attendance rate. However, quarterly meetings with education stakeholders, teachers, will be carried out for experience sharing and lessons learned; while monthly coordination meetings including education officials, community members, teachers will be held  to analyze beneficiaries perceptions and adjust the program accordingly.

Teachers' capacity building on   effective pedagogical techniques including ICT skills  to facilitate catch up  education programming is critical, as schools systems adapt their curricula to catch up learning programming.In addition building teachers' capacity on ICT is inevitable within the context of covid-19. Thus, community-based  rechargeable radio programing is the unique, suitable and contextual   alternate education programming for under-served and marginalized rural learners with limited power supply, data, internet devices left out in distanced online radios and TV broadcasting. In fact, this remedial/ catch up program is inclusive, thus filling the gaps of distanced online radios.

African Humanitarian Aid International(AHAI)  with CERF funds, and in consortium with five (05) international Organizations, including Save the children, Street child, Plan International, and Trans-cultural and psycho-social Organization    is currently implementing a catch up/remedial education programing amidst covid-19. the program builds capacities of teachers on contextual,  innovative  effective pedagogy: teaching at the right level (TARL) and mine risk education so as to facilitate access to quality safe and inclusive education for the under-served and marginalized boys and girls of The North East Nigeria in rehabilitated temporal learning spaces (TLS).  With the experience and lessons learned, AHAI will like to expand the community-based learning radio program to Cameroonian refugees of rural host communities of Cross-river state.

improving teachers' capacities is very innovative: the program uses tablets to build teachers capacities. in fact, teachers are provided with USB flashes where the capacity building package  is uploaded into tablets. The curriculum is conceived for remote individual capacity building. in fact, the program does not require teachers to be grouped in a hall or temporal learning spaces so as to acquire the skills, rather each trainee receives training materials in his tablets. in addition, the training package ( soft  copies)  are  uploaded in the Federal ministry of education platform for ease of access and sustainability. in addition, the program provides teachers with new psycho-social support to deal with their emotions, while a package of prevention and response to covid-19 is also included plus PPE. However, child participation and child safeguarding is also an innovative technique that is  mainstreamed into  teachers'  capacity building so as to protect learners from sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA).

currently the  solution serves 10,000 people in a year it shall serve 2,000 and in 5 years 40,000

the indicators to the impact are :

1200 teachers trained

2,000 teachers provide with teaching materials.

5,000 teachers  benefited with monthly incentives.

20,000 people reached with awareness campaigns  messages on safe go back to schools and gender equality.

10,000 girls and boys provided with learning materials.

10, 000 under-served and marginalized boys and girls provided with scholarships for enrollment.

100 temporal learning spaces  constructed/ rehabilitated

The actual solution works with: 5 Full staff namely, Education in emergency specialist, Meal manager, logistic/ procurement manager, and PSEA specialist, Finance manager . Plus 1 contractual staff: consultant. 3 part-time ( support staff) : administration officer, and country Director.

African Humanitarian Aid International (AHAI) has a track record in implementation of remedial education amidst Covid-19. The organization is actually implementing a  community-based radio program in the North East Nigeria, with crisis-affected Under-served and marginalized internally displaced (IDPs) in Adamawa state. The organization has a gender-sensitive team of well experienced and qualified staff with at least 5 years of both local and international experienced in education in emergency programming.  AHAI has a qualified Education in Emergency(EIE) specialist. she has a progressive 7 years  experience in the North East , central Africa , west Africa implementing education programs. in addition, AHAI has a qualified Finance manager with  6 years  with mastery of international financial policies  with vast knowledge with  donors procedures, including UN and other donors ( USAID, DFID). In addition, the organization has a good procurement manager with track record of  organization and donors procurement policies. he  has managed  up to five (5) programs involving procurement of close to $ 100, 000 to $ 500,000 each.  in addition, the Organization has a good PSEA specialist. she has seven (7) years  with several organizations  in the capacity of gender-based violence program officer, manager. she has an international experience in child participation and safeguarding. she will ensure capacity building of teachers and SBMCs on protection from sexual exploitation and abuse (PSEA) standard principles.  The organization also has on board supportive staff: country representative and administration staff who will ensure coordination and supervision of the program.   

African Humanitarian Aid International (AHAI) a gender-sensitive team is  made up of women and men of vast experience and qualification. The diversity of  the organization  team is founded on the fact, beneficiaries are different ( male, female, disabled) thus have different needs and require different approaches. In addition, beneficiaries needs vary as per sex, age and gender. So meeting the needs of core recipients necessitates a gender-sensitive team, from needs assessment to monitoring and evaluation. AHAI has a gender sensitive team because, she wants to effectively impact the beneficiaries by meeting their needs as per sex, age and gender.

AHAI is applying with solve because, we want to raise funds and  also have a support from Solve  to improve teachers capacities so as to enable under-served and marginalized refugees to access quality inclusive and safe education.

The partnership may be needed  with national or local organizations for data collection in the areas where AHAI face difficulties. In this case, the local partner shall be  equipped in data collection techniques.

In the vent that, partnership is required for the implementation of this program, AHAI will partner with a local organization with field presence and capacities in Cross-river State. The partnership will be based on data collection and third party monitoring where, AHAI staff can not reach.

I do qualify for this prize because, the solution meets the requirements. i would like to be considered for the funding.

AHAI do qualify for the  funding opportunity because this program is centered on meeting the education needs of Cameroonian refugees, which is in line with ANDAN prize priority.

African Humanitarian Aid International also qualifies for this opportunity, for this education program aims at giving  equal opportunity to both children of urban and rural areas through teachers capacity building improvement. So the program  align with GM prize for education  core goal.

AHAI do qualify for this Prize and would like to be considered for funding. in fact, the program is centered on the use of digital technology ( tablets) for  teachers capacity building.

No AHAI is not qualify for this opportunity.