Orkeeswa Secondary School, in a rural-remote Maasai area of Tanzania, opened with around 40 students in April 2009. I was Orkeeswa’s only non-teaching volunteer in the first year. Orkeeswa today has around 400 students at an increasingly beautiful and well-resourced campus.
In September 2024, I returned to Tanzania to witness Orkeeswa’s growth and impact.
Here’s what stood out:
- Locally staffed – no more western volunteers.
- Teacher and support staff qualifications are world class with evident passion for their posting.
- Alumni returning to their community with relevant qualifications and experience.
- Permaculture and paving replacing mud and dust.
- School garden now producing enough fruit & veg to feed the whole school in the wet season.
- Integrated life skills – small groups of students were deep in discussion daily in gardens, pavillions and classrooms.
- Orkeeswa Outreach – student and alumni volunteers teach life skills, academic and sporting curriculum in 9 local government primary schools supported by paid counsellors.
- Orkeeswa Incubator – supporting students to achieve their post-secondary goals. I met with student Bariki, whose Maasai family traditionally keep bees. Bariki makes his own hives, uses a pushbike to transport them 20km, and was selling raw honey on a small scale in cut-off salvaged water bottles. Orkeeswa helped Bariki with surgery to correct impaired mobility, and the Incubator program is supporting him to develop viable boutique honey production.
- WAEV (Women’s Agri-Enviro Vision) founded by Saing’orie Sangau from Orkeeswa’s first year in 2009. Along with women’s economic empowerment and literacy, WAEV is proving women, villages and schools can establish trees (nearly 150,000 planted) and food crops for shade, regeneration of severe erosion, improved soil nutrition and food security.
- Deputy Head of School, Hosea, was also from the first class in 2009.
District Governor Rob Uhl invites all to attend what looks to be a great conference.
It is really pleasing to welcome PDG Geoff Tancred back to Rotary. He was inducted into our Club by President Rosie at our meeting held 27th August. Geoff originally joined Orange Calare Club, D9700 in 1986. The Rotary Club of Orange Calare offered our Club their charter when the Rotary E-Club Serving Humanity was formed.
(more…)In July the PIMD team travelled to Sri Lanka for meetings with the Ministry of Education, Provincial authorities in North, Eastern, and Central Province, as well as running two Phonics Implementation Planning workshops in Gurudeniya for Central Province and Akkaraipattu for Eastern Province.
Any donation to assist would be appreciated.
Rosie is a versatile and adaptable Service Manager with Uniting working in a Residential Aged Care facility.
She has diverse experience across administrative support, training and assessing, vocational education, strategic planning, HR, finance, IT, management and leadership which i have transferred into the amazing Aged Care space.
Rosie has a passion for improvement and collaborative work across all stakeholders with a positive encouraging perspective.
Rosie is married to Mal Dunnett who is our President Elect for 2025-26 and they work together on their project – Community Development & Education Assistance, Santa Isabel, Solomon Islands .
District Governor Andrea Grosvenor awarded our Club the District Governor’s appreciation Award for Excellence in International Service 2023-24.
The award was announced at the District Changeover held at Young, NSW on Saturday 22nd June. The award was received by Mark Schipp, who becomes a member of our Club as of 1st July 2024.
Our International Service project manager’s are proud that our work was recognised by our District.
RAWCS Project 20-2023-24 sponsored by E-Club Serving Humanity
We are looking for your help to support YOSA (Youth Opportunities South Africa) a charity close to the heart of many Qantas Cabin and Flight crew.
The YOSA charity was founded by Astonishment Marupisa and like most non-profit organizations, YOSA needs financial support. Unlike many other charities, we can personally vouch for exactly where any funding to YOSA goes as this is validated to the point where a Qantas Pilot and former cabin crew sit on the advisory board but if you want to learn more just take a look thorough our website.
(more…)President John de Ridder
John joined the Rotary Club of Nelson Bay, D9670 in March 2013 and transferred to E-Club Serving Humanity in June 2021.
John de Ridder is recognized locally and internationally as an experienced telecommunications economist. Since leaving Telstra in 2002, he has worked locally for private corporations, regulators and governments. Sometimes, this work is performed as a sub-contractor to a larger consultant (eg GQI Consulting , NERA and LECG).
(more…)PIMD has partnered with the University of Jaffna and the Eastern University of Sri Lanka to offer the PIMD teacher training as short courses through their online and distance learning centres. The first course to be offered is “Teaching Phonological Awareness and Phonics for English in Schools”. 700 primary English teachers applied for the first round in December 2022. The course will run multiple times in 2023 to allow all of these teachers to participate. Further collaboration with the Universities is planned.
When we established our online Rotary E-Club Serving Humanity with members from different locations and backgrounds we thought it would benefit our members to build a relationship together assisting less fortunate people in countries other than where we live and work.
One of the Rotary avenues of service is International Service and KIVA allows us to contribute to small projects and entrepreneurs in many countries.
What is KIVA?
More than 1.7 billion people around the world do not have access to banks and cannot access the financial services they need. Kiva is an international non-profit organisation, founded in 2005 in San Francisco, with a mission to expand financial access to help underserved communities thrive.
(more…)