PCVL Orientation

This was my last official week as a PCVL and no better way to cap it off than to lead an orientation for the new group!

The orientation was a few weeks in the making and the activities leading up to it included a complete overhaul of the PCVL role. This was spearheaded by myself and another PCVL with support and oversight by our post's Director of Programming and Training (DPT). We wanted to make the position more meaningful and find ways to add additional value to it and to the post through PCVL involvement. This meant meeting with program staff, admin, and the training team to see exactly how PCVLs could be of greatest use and then negotiating the new job description accordingly with the DPT and Country Director.

The big reveal happened the day before the orientation and the current PCVL team and the staff were very excited about the direction the role is taking.

The orientation was jam-packed with sessions to explain the enhanced position, with technical training and meetings with all the departments in Peace Corps to provide practical application and explanation of PCVL duties. Round-table discussions added value and we were able to unpack the position and come up with even better ideas for working together. Everyone left with renewed vigour towards the position, myself included and I only have days left!

I am really excited about the direction the PCVL role is taking and I am happy to be a part of that movement. I genuinely believe that this position, which is still fairly new at our post, is going to be one of the best that Peace Corps has to offer.

IECD Resource Pack In Action

For nearly a year, I have been working as part of a technical team to develop a resource pack to train educators and communities about integrated early childhood development (IECD). In my final days working at PCI, we finished the IECD Resource Pack and received approval from the Government of Botswana for it to be used as part of a curriculum to certify pre-school teachers from rural and remote communities. This was a huge feat for us and something we were very proud to achieve because of its potential positive impact for these most at-risk communities.

This week we started our very first training using the IECD Resource Pack. My counterpart in the effort called me to thank me for all of the great work I did and to let me know that the training was going exceedingly well and she was so happy. Yesterday, the US Embassy in Botswana posted about this training (and, subsequently, my resource pack) on their Facebook page. It is wonderful that our project is getting accolades and visibility in this way. I am so proud to have been a key player in this project and am excited to see where it goes from here.

Published: A Toolkit For Better Life Skills Education

Behold! The very first printed draft of the Adolescent Life Skills Toolkit I put together!

After meeting last week with relevant heads of all Botswana's Ministries and other pertinent stakeholders, it has been confirmed that the final draft of my toolkit will be adopted by the Botswana Government and used to strengthen the country's current national strategy for life skills education! Booyah! Now that's a Peace Corps win!

IECD and LS Technical Working Retreat

Much of my work at PCI has been focused on integrated early childhood development (IECD) and life skills (LS). I have been working very hard to improve the lives of young children and adolescents in Botswana by creating better systems and resources and enhancing the access to and understanding of programs for the most rural and vulnerable communities. As part of this effort, I have conducted focus groups on effective facilitation of LS material (LS topics include communication, self-esteem and awareness, critical thinking, and so on), lead workshops for single teenage mothers, met with stakeholders and partners from across the country, providing technical assistance to civil society organizations working in these areas, and drafted and compiled concept notes and resource books set for publication on both IECD and LS.

This last project is of particular note because it was a catalyst for a workshop eleven years in the making. Yes, eleven.

In 2003, the Botswana Government partnered with UNICEF to analyze the IECD and LS programs. They found both to be lacking and called for a technical team to be constructed and a way forward agreed upon. To date, nothing of substance has been done to address this mandate. They have, however, created "frameworks", which essentially are merely outlines, of what the desired outcomes would be for IECD and LS programs for children and adolescents. There were many MANY gaps left to be filled in and the right players had not stepped up to the plate.

Our week-long "technical working retreat", as we called it, brought heads of Government Ministries and stakeholders together to accomplish a handful of very important objectives. Of note: finally addressing the challenges and gaps with IECD and LS in Botswana; determining who is responsible for various components of these programs; reviewing the documents PCI and I proposed (which should act as the "filler" for the frameworks); and making technical, policy, and advocacy recommendations for national program revisions. We wanted people to understand what was going on, to take ownership over the situation and their roles, and to create a plan for what our ideal "model" would be for IECD and LS. This was an invariable who's who of leaders in their fields and they were poised and ready to tackle these hard issues. After eleven years of waiting, we made it happen.

Without going into too much detail about the five days (for fear of boring you with jargon and nitty gritty), I want to say that the retreat was an overwhelming success. The background was given, the studies were read, and a greater understanding was reached. The people became instantly motivated to make a change. We were able to have the conversations with all the right parties present and really hash out the intricacies of what works, what doesn't, and what we would like to see in IECD and LS education, especially for those most marginalized populations. And we did it in front of each other, meaning there should be accountability as we move forward. Basically, the environment was right. We now have task forces set up to deal with smaller issues and we have a larger plan for tackling the entire project. We are on the same page.

In the months before I close my service and finish my time with PCI, I will be packaging the ideas for our model program into something that can be discussed, marketed, and implemented, as well as meeting with all of the task forces to monitor their progress in addressing the key issues agreed upon at the retreat and finalizing the documents I have been working on and beginning to train partners and stakeholders on how to use them. There is still so much to be done but we are on the right track.

And what a beautiful place to be doing this all in...

PC Botswana's First All Volunteer Conference

Peace Corps Botswana held its very first all volunteer conference to commemorate 10 years of HIV/AIDS work in country. This was a monumental time for our post and something worth acknowledging on a grand scale.

For three days, all 134 volunteers from across the country gathered together in one of the capital's nicest hotels to share best practices, to coordinate collaborations, and to be briefed on the scope of key issues facing Botswana to date as a means of developing pragmatic solutions and innovative projects.

I am proud to say that the conference was an overwhelming success. It was met with praise by volunteers and distinguished guests alike, both for the content of the sessions and for the overall event. And this is no small feat when your guests include the American Ambassador to Botswana and the heads of many international organizations like the CDC and Baylor Center for Excellence.

I am even more proud because the planning, logistics, and execution of the entire event was entrusted, in large part, to myself and a fellow PCVL. This meant long hours working alongside staff, making calls to representatives from various international and national organizations, meeting with banquet managers at the site, making session plans and outlining evening activities (complete with a "coffee house"!), and stuffing personalized folders and making name tags for every PCV, among other tasks. It was a tireless effort that paid off in spades. I am so grateful to have been given the opportunity to support such a significant event for our post - the very first of its kind. And I am so happy that it was deemed "the best training to date" by PCVs. Because, after all, they're who it was all for!

Young Single Mothers Workshop

We all too often take for granted things that shape who we are. Things like upbringing, presence of supportive caregivers and adults, nutrition, and friends. But what if these things didn't exist in our lives? Or if they were offered in fragments and then taken away from you? What if you were an orphan and raised yourself? There are lessons learned in life that naturally happen in so many of our homes and schools that we don't even recognize. What happens when people don't learn how to communicate effectively or care for their basic needs? I am now much more conscious of that reality, as it is the basis for much of the work I have been doing in the past months. This has given me the opportunity to delve deeper into the issues facing the youth of Botswana, in particular, young women.

Twenty-three young single mothers turned up for the two-day workshop run by one of our implementing partners in a nearby village. I was invited to attend to support the partner and assist in facilitating sessions on self-awareness, self-esteem, and communication. I was joined by two other members of the PCI team and some nurses from the local clinic, who were scheduled to discuss sexual reproductive health and topics on caring for young children.

The workshop was designed to be participatory, encouraging the young women to search for their own solutions and to create a sense of community among those in similar circumstance. As such, activities were collaborative, involving a lot of group work and discussions, and the women were challenged to work through differences in order to create viable options for their collective future. This meant focusing on problem solving, planning, and critical thinking - all of which are often neglected in a country that prides its education system on rote memorization.

Overcoming the challenges of the workshop model was met first with argument and then, in time, with laughter. The latter lead to dialogue that brought great results and the girls began to prosper. It wasn't long before the women were opening up and starting to acknowledge some of their commonalities (something we believe will unite them and give them strength). It was empowering to witness.

In the end, the women made great strides in both their approach to examining and addressing issues, as well as in creating a team among one another. They were able to learn from one another and, thereby teaching them lessons long deprived. What's more, the partner organization gained the experience in facilitating a workshop of this nature and have vowed to follow the women and support them as they work towards implementing some of the activities they decided, as a team, to go for. They are no longer orphans, alone, trying to overcome hardship and raise children. They are together.

This is the sort of sustainable development that we always hope for - the kind where people learn how to help themselves and local organizations gain the skills necessary to support those efforts. I am going to be mentoring this organization for the final months of my contract but I am confident in their ability to continue in this manner. I am just proud to be there to witness it.

"Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are.

When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you."

Virtues Project Workshop A Success!

Buddha said: "Just as treasures are uncoverd from earth, so virtue appears from good deeds, and wisdom appears from a pure and peaceful mind. To walk safely through the maze of human life, one needs the light of wisdom and the guidance of virtue." It was with this sentiment in mind that a team of us brought The Virtues Project to Botswana to host its very first skills workshop (which I discussed in an earlier post).

I am very proud to announce that the workshop, which was held earlier this week, was a huge success! Nearly sixty people were trained on the Five Strategies of The Virtues Project, which emphasize love, patience, and compassion. The material, which was geared at educators in rural Africa, provided a fresh way to work with children and youth and offered new ways to address the key issues of punishment, boundaries, and relationship-building. All of these being vital to growth and progress when working with this demographic, and issues that need to be refocused in Botswana specifically.

Positive feedback from all participants gives us confidence that the lessons will be implemented across the country. Acclaim for the workshop came from Peace Corps Volunteer participants who work in youth development, primarily within the school system, and from their host country counterparts: "A lot of us wanted to bring these methods to our schools but didn't know how. This is a great way to do that. Even better, my counterpart liked [the training] too!"

I want to congratulate everyone that was part of the team that brought this workshop to Botswana and thank all participants for their willingness to examine a new approach to these issues. I was honored to be a part of this workshop and hope it's something that will continue on in the years to come... And I know the teachers I spoke with afterwards would too!

My New Roles: Third Year Begins

My last few weeks have been jam-packed as I moved into my new apartment in Gaborone, said goodbye to a dear friend, mourned a loss, settled in, and officially began working at my third year assignments. Needless to say, there has been a lot of adjustment - something that I have gotten used to in my time abroad. Through it all, I maintain that the best things in life are seized out of moments like this - when there is an air of uncertainty coupled with a sense of adventure and an open mind. Change, vulnerability, adjustment, and opportunity are the lifeblood of a Peace Corps Volunteer.

So far, the adjustments to my new assignments - as a Volunteer Leader for Peace Corps and a Technical Advisor for PCI - have been positive. The orientations went smoothly, I have remained very excited about the work, I already feel a deep sense of purpose, and the teams I will be assisting are among the best I have known.

With PCI, I will be working with a very diverse and multicultural group of people, hailing from the far corners of the globe. Their experience is just as varied, which offers me ample opportunity to learn and grow. Similarly, the components of the $16.7 million project that PCI has me working on are just as multifarious, ranging from behavior change to economic empowerment to orphan care to integrated early childhood education and finally to women's empowerment. These facets are intertwined, thereby offering me a chance to work alongside specialists and implementing partners in all areas of the project.

While the opportunities for professional growth and exposure to various topics are plenty, there is also much more clarity in my exact role with PCI. I will be advising particularly on the integrated early childhood education (IECD) component and helping mainstream gender (which the project incorporates into all areas). My exact deliverables go as follows:

• Draft and finalize an Adolescent Life Skills Toolkit. This toolkit will be adopted as part of Botswana's National Strategy for life skills education. In this vein, I will also develop a training plan to introduce this toolkit to partners, stakeholders, and government. 
• Finalize an IECD Resource Pack and develop a training plan to launch it. This includes researching and writing resource modules and rolling out trainings on the resource pack to PCI partners and stakeholders.
• Provide technical assistance to setting up an "IECD Model Site" at a village outside the capital to demonstrate best practices. This is from concept to national expansion.
• Plan and organize an IECD Forum to be attended by Botswana Government, USAID, and other key national and international agencies.
• Assist with monitoring and evaluation and reporting of the implementation of the IECD project component according to USAID's indicators. This includes conducting field monitoring activities and compiling M&E reports.

This role has me pushing myself to a higher level. It will be both challenging and immensely rewarding. And, if I am able to satisfactorily pull it all off within my one year's time, be an exceptional feat! Regardless, I am thrilled about the learning opportunity and what I stand to gain from it all. I mean, how many people can say they published two nationally-adopted manuals and created a model site from scratch?! I hope to be among those who can...

My role with Peace Corps is every bit as elaborate and will have me keeping extra busy - and, yes, it may actually feel like having two full-time jobs. It spans an array of duties, including providing technical assistance and information to volunteers, assisting staff with site development and conflict mediation, giving feedback on post and volunteer assignments, and so on.

To date, I have been being a mentor to the incoming group of Peace Corps Trainees who will be coming in two short weeks. This means hosting conference calls to discuss various topics (home stay, safety and security, packing, etc) and responding to countless emails as they prepare to come to Botswana. It has been fun getting to know them prior to arrival and makes me even more excited to meet them and participate in their upcoming training. I have also started helping with site development for the incoming group - attending community meetings to assess buy-in of the village, meeting with potential host agencies, and talking with Peace Corps staff about sites. My involvement has been minimal so far but even getting a taste of what's to come has been compelling. All in all, I think the role as a PCVL will offer extremely valuable insight into the oversight and running of a field office.

That is my third year, in brief. Or at least how it looks today. 

My professional career to date has been varied. I have found the utmost satisfaction doing hands-on capacity building, as with the grassroots development work of my last two years. It will be interesting to see how this new path will feel. Will it be rewarding? Will I like this hybrid office-field assignment? Does it feel different working in an office setting now that I see the direct results in the field? Will this change the course of my future? I will keep you all apprised of my evolution and my impression of the work. I can say that I am most confident and excited about what lays before me. And I am certain that it will be a rewarding, challenging, and eye-opening year.

Mid-Service Training

Reunited and it feels so good!

The past two weeks in Bots...

A lot has happened since my last post... It is time to catch you all up on my happenings in Botswana.

In-Service Training (IST):

For a week and a half I joined my fellow Bots 10ers in a neighboring village, Mogoditshane, for what is called in-service training. Basically what that means is we continue working on our language acquisition, delve deeper into cultural issues, and participate in skills training seminars on topics such as program design and implementation, proposal writing, and monitoring and evaluation. Unofficially, it is also a time when we can reconnect with other volunteers. This second part may have been the most beneficial part of IST for me. I say this because it was an opportunity to talk with my colleagues about their experiences at site. In hearing everyone's stories, I was relieved to learn that many of us are having similar issues and dealing with the same emotions. The difficulty of working in a developing country, even one that is as seemingly progressive as Botswana, is evident in each of our stories. (Having cell phone coverage and electricity does not accurately indicate Botswana's state of development. It is merely a facade. Take this cover out of the equation and the reality is that Botswana is nascent. The challenges are very real and we have a lot to contend with and are being heavily impacted.) It was a time to share coping strategies, to learn from one another, to gain new skills and valuable insight, and then to let go of our worries and have a little fun too.

In addition to our classroom sessions, we saw movies, ate good food, drank cocktails, caught up on gossip and stories, sat in the sunshine reading magazines, watched television (mostly Animal Planet), and took long hot showers. It was all the things we had been missing out on for four months. Bonus: we were together. Although it was a little overstimulating (going from two months of solitude to constant interaction), it was so reviving to be among my friends. Along the way we have gotten closer and it truly felt like family as we roamed from room to room to visit one another. The last time we had been at that lodge, we had just arrived in country and were on our best behavior. Now we are just ourselves and that felt pretty perfect.

Also, we had another Language Proficiency Interview (LPI), which is a fancy term for language test. I didn't realize how much Setswana I had learned during lockdown. Being in my village and muddling through with the neighbor kids, the OVCs, and the rest of my community has really rubbed off on me. It felt good to be at a point where I can converse and be comfortable in Setswana. It also gave me some confidence and has encouraged me to push myself to use the language even more. Overall, not too shabby.

Puppies:

Seven puppies were born on my compound about a month and a half ago. They are ridiculously adorable and so so sweet. I've been documenting their growth through pictures and was absolutely shocked to see how big they got while I was gone at IST. They are adventurous and playful and extremely cuddly. (As I type this, there are puppies wandering into my house to explore and to get some quality snuggle time in.) They have been vaccinated and are ready to go to new homes. Three of Bots 10ers and one of the language teachers are adopting puppies so I will still get to watch them grow up over the next two years. So excited, so precious.

Local Artists and their Beautiful Work:

I went with a few friends to the neighboring village of Gabane a few days ago. There are a lot of signs on the main road for arts and crafts, pottery, local fruits, etc. I pass the village whenever I go to buy groceries and have always meant to stop and check it all out but hadn't yet so I was so excited when my visitors wanted to go too. We wandered through Gabane, stopping to greet villagers on our way to find the shops. Once there, we were welcomed by artists and potters and craftsmen alike all working on their particular trade. We got to watch as they threw local clay to make beautiful bowls and pitchers and various other sundries. It was a site to behold watching them create. (If anyone comes to visit, we will certainly be going there and you will undoubtably buy some amazing local art.)

Garden Project:

Yesterday I broke ground on a garden for the village OVCs (orphans and vulnerable children) and people infected with HIV. The garden is about the size of a football field, has amazing soil (a rarity in Botswana), and should produce a lot of food to feed all those affected by and infected with HIV. To help me with the project, a rotation of friends from the Bots 10 group are coming to my village and putting in a few days at a time. They are joining me, a few members of my NGO's staff, and a flow of community members and children. We are all getting our hands dirty in an effort to help the Kumakwane community.

These past two days have been designing a plan for the plot, which will have eight 24'X24' plots (inside a covered area) and a small fruit tree orchard beside the enclosed structure. We also spent four painstaking hours digging the initial trench system to route the underground water source and irrigate the garden. By the time we were finished, we were covered in mud, our hands blistered, and thoroughly exhausted. We are also invigorated because we are starting to see the potential come to life. Tomorrow we will plant the trees, continue digging trenches, and (hopefully) get a few beds in one or two of the plots ready for planting.

The garden is going to be a huge undertaking and it will probably take months to get it entirely put together but, in the end, it's something that will last and will sustain those in need. It's something viable, substantial, and impactful.

Evening of Cultural Exchange:

Before last night, I had never been to a bar in my village. (Actually, I'm never out after dark because the Peace Corps scared the bejesus out of us... unnecessarily it seems.) But yesterday I saw a sign on a bar that I've been curious about since I moved to site (it has monkeys painted on the side and picnic tables) that was advertising "Jazz" starting at 4pm. Having four Bots 10ers with my to work on the garden project, we decided we had strength in numbers and would venture out to check out the jazz. Everyone stared at us when we walked into the compound (read: large fenced yard reminiscent of a beer garden) and we made our way to the bar (aka one-room house with a bar and a few fridges). We ordered drinks (in Setswana) and went outside to listen to the DJ playing local music. Everyone was dancing around and sitting at tables talking among their friends. The occasional person would come over and introduce themselves to us and chat for a little while. It was cordial, comfortable, and really really nice (so unlike what we had been told).

I met a girl that was orphaned at six-years-old and who utilized services at my NGO as a child. We talked about what it's like to lose a parent, about her goal to visit another country some day, and her fears about the future. She is raising her young cousins who were orphaned. She's only 20. She has a dream of starting a small support group for youth to provide them with clothes and toiletries and help them come of age as an orphan. I am going to help her get started.

We met a handful of other people and then we got to watch traditional dance and listen to local music. It was a really fun time.

On our way home, we were walking down my earthen road when a truck suddenly went off the road and rolled into a ditch and onto its side. We ran over to see if the driver was okay and to help him get out of the vehicle. Within minutes there were four cars shining their headlights onto the rolled car and two dozen people all clambering to help. It didn't take long before the driver was out of the car, completely unharmed, and we started to work at getting the truck out of the ditch and back on the road. Everyone was calm as we brainstormed ways to move the truck, knowing that we could do it if we all worked together. And it did take all of us pulling and pushing and wrenching to get the truck back on the road but, about 45 minutes later, the man was heading home.

What inspired me most was how everyone came together, literally crawling out of the woodwork, to help. I have rarely seen such collectivism and community. It was a testament to the type of people the Batswana are. I felt pretty proud to be a part of this community last night. It's wonderful to be a part of something that is so unified, resourceful, and charitable.

Next Major Milestone: IST

Tomorrow I reach my next landmark on the Peace Corps Volunteer's journey: In-Service Training (IST). Tomorrow I will head to a nearby village to start two more weeks of training with Peace Corps. There I will be reunited with my Bots 10 family - we will share stories, impart our collective knowledge, and gain new skills through intensive training. We will be together for the first time in two months (which seems like an eternity when you went through something as bonding as PST together). And at the end of IST, we will officially be off of "lockdown". This means that we made it! We made it through our assessment phase and our period of relative isolation and now we can go explore this new world together. We accomplished something monumental and we can rejoice!

I am grateful to have gotten to this point. Of course, it wasn't without hardship but I believe it made me even more appreciative of where I am now. T minus 24 hours until the celebration begins!