You Can't Deny the Facts

By David Hylton, Public Relations Specialist

Poverty is a global problem affecting billions of people. In 2002, Christian Children’s Fund conducted a comprehensive study on the experience and impact of poverty on children and youth.

As part of Blog Action Day, we wanted to share with you the major findings of the study. Later today we will share with you stories from children and youth detailing how poverty impacts them. Then we’ll close out the day with a post on our thoughts on how to combat poverty.

Here are the key findings from the 2002 study:
* Children understand poverty as a deeply physical, emotional and social experience. Many children in CCF programs prioritize the psychological and social experience of poverty, such as humiliation, as being more significant than any material deprivation.

* Children are more sensitive to and affected by poverty than adults realize. Children are aware of poverty’s divisive nature and feel its effects in terms of changing and constraining their relationships with family and friends.

* Children experience poverty as a continuously changing condition. This is due to the interaction of several processes at the personal, family, communal and structural level. For example, during times of conflict, distinctions such as those based on gender and ethnicity often grow for children who feel the least valued. “You feel lonely, you feel ashamed,” a 16-year-old girl from Kenya said during the study.

* Children are active contributors to their own well-being. In most circumstances, children do have options and make choices that impact their situation.

* Lastly, the range of experiences felt by children in poverty can be classified into three interrelated dimensions: deprivation (lack of essential material conditions), exclusion (on the basis of age, gender, class, etc.) and vulnerability (with regard to the changing array of threats in their environments).

To understand how poverty affects children, you have to hear it directly from those impacted. While the CCF study was taking place, here’s what one 17-year-old girl said: “Poverty means unequal relationships with others. If you are poor, you suffer from stigma. Others look at you in a certain way like you’re worthless. Feeling unimportant: No one will listen to me, no one cares for me … I’m poor, I don’t count, I’m a piece of dirt.”

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Blog Action Day, Here We Come

By David Hylton, Public Relations Specialist

“Poverty isn’t something you can fully convey in a photo,” says Christian Children’s Fund President and CEO Anne Goddard. “It is overwhelming. It is massive.”

In an attempt to more fully convey the impact of poverty, CCF will join Internet bloggers worldwide on Oct. 15 to take part in Blog Action Day.

Blog Action Day is a nonprofit event started by volunteers in 2007 to unite the world’s bloggers, podcasters and videocasters to post blog entries about the same issue on the same day. Last year more than 20,000 blogs participated in the event, which focused on the environment. This year’s theme focuses on poverty, which is an issue CCF tackles every day.

We’ll share with you details of a CCF poverty study from a few years ago, but the big highlight will be how the world’s youth view poverty.

For more information on visit Blog Action Day.

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The Community Owns this Center

By Stephanie Kulenguski, Web Content Editor

As we bump along the red-dirt road on our way to see an Early Childhood Development program (my first program visit) my mind wanders. What I am going to see? What will the staff talk about? Will the kids want to meet me or will they shy away from me? Anticipation wells up in me and I get that butterflies-in-the-stomach feeling. I am prepared through; I have my notepad, pen and water bottle (just in case I get dehydrated from talking too much.)

I focus my attention on the surrounding scenery outside the CCF truck. We are passing through a market near Kampala, Uganda. Bright colors detail the ramshackle-booths we pass – almost neon-green plantains are EVERYWHERE, a staple in Ugandan diet, and not just individual plantains (bananas), large stalks hold at least 4 dozen of these small plantains. There are tomatoes, cassava, corn, eggplants and to my fascination – large stalks of sugarcane, we ride by a man precariously balancing his sugarcane load on the back of his bike.

The road splits and we veer to the right, I see the sign for the Gayaza Early Childhood Development Center and know we are near! The driver slows as he makes a left onto a small dirt road, I notice the cow tied up by the side of the road grazing on a patch of grass, past the cow is a long white building, we have arrived!

I am immediately greeted by many staff that usher me into the main office to discuss the program. Staff debriefed me on the ECD center, I learned that the center had been opened since 2002 and served children from infancy through age 8. Currently about 50-60 children attend this center. Some of the services they provide include:

-Training for caregivers and parents
-Growth monitoring
-Play materials and workshops on how to build toys from readily available materials
-A resting area (which is essentially a cot or bed, they do not have a nap time since children only attend the center for half-days)
-One – two meals a day at the center
-Immunizations
-Administration of Child Development Scale

I find all this very interesting but what interests me more and becomes clear to me is that CCF does not own this program -- the community does. The community gives input on how the program should be run, what the needs of the children are and that EVERYONE (parents and caregivers) all volunteer. They help prepare breakfast and or lunch, they help attend the children during center hours and help to tend the center’s garden. The community gives the advice and feedback on how the center should be run -- it is the community’s ECD center.

After a very exciting and informative tour it is time for me to leave. When leaving I look back out the rear window, the staff waves their goodbyes but what I notice is a young girl who is cared for by her grandmother (her parents have died) standing by herself against the wall of the center -- she may be standing alone, but she is definitely not on her own, she is supported by staff, CCF, her grandmother, mothers assisting at the center and the community, they are all supporting her, standing behind her -- even when she stands by herself.

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Bright Futures for Children and Youth in The Gambia

By Cynthia Price, Director of Communications

Following lunch we travel to Somita Village. The children are dressed in plaid green uniforms and greet us with several songs. They present a drama about the value of education. A father does not want his daughter to attend school but the mother begs him to allow the girl to attend so that she can have a better life. He finally agrees. The daughter jumps up and down and says, “I am happy my father lets me go to school.”

We visit several of the classrooms. The rooms are clean, bright, and cheerful. The walls are decorated with appropriate educational information. In the classrooms for the younger children, the colors are listed on the walls as are the days of the week. Blocks of paper are filled in with a specific color, showing that the children are working on learning their colors.

Several villagers are at work in the kitchen. The children eat at school because they often have to travel great distances to get there. At school children learn to eat a balanced meal. Again, they can take that knowledge home and share it with their family.
After visiting several classroom we also visit the Somita Health Center. About 100 people are treated each month on an out-patient basis.

From there we travel to Sibanor Village. The rains continue. At this point we are no longer on paved roads, but rather dirt roads that are now mud from the rains. Potholes and culverts must be avoided and the rain creates a layer that is almost as slick as ice. The driver is attentive and gets us to each of our destinations safely and without incident.

At the Sibanor Village we hear from the younger children who sing a welcoming song, “Wherever You Come From.” The older youth share their experiences with Junior Achievement. In this village 32 youth are participating. Hatab, one of the youth, says, “We are learning about disciplined money habits that we hope will continue into adulthood.”

Several commented that while they don’t have much money, they used to spend all that they had. “Now, we’re learning how to save and to budget,” one youth said.

They are five months into the program and are identifying opportunities. Their goal is to operate three businesses within the community. They are considering a gas station, herding of animals, and even a manufacturing enterprise.

Anne tells the group, “When trying to think of a business, think of what the people will buy.”

We then learn about the Water Pyramid. Sibanor is the main village in this part of The Gambia and for years there was limited healthy drinking water. Women had to wait in line at the few working wells. Then a few years ago, Ding Ding Bantaba Child and family Support Association and CCF The Gambia succeeded in getting a water project grant funded by World Bank through a Dutch organization. The system uses boreholes and rainwater collection techniques that provide up to 5,000 liters of clean water per day. It also provides distilled waters, which the villages are working to market and sell, thereby providing additional funds to the village.

This is the last program we are scheduled to visit. Throughout our visits, we have been shown great hospitality. Anne and I are both amazed and inspired by the dancing and joy of the villagers. We saw first hand how sponsorships and donations are changing the lives of the children and youth, and, ultimately, the villages. We saw children learning about how to lead healthier lives. They shared the messages with us, and we know they are sharing the messages at home where they also are changing attitudes for the better.

We heard first hand the importance of education. The youth talked about their commitment to staying in school. They also shared about the importance of learning skills that they can use throughout their lives and the importance of saving the money they earn. It’s clear that many of these youths will grow up to be leaders of the future.

Although there are obstacles to overcome, the children and youth clearly have hope and brighter futures. As Anne noted, “CCF has created a revolution in the community.”

I know we’ll be hearing more from these children and youth. I look forward to that day.

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Listening to the Voices of Youth

By Cynthia Price, Director of Communications

We are now in The Gambia. A brief plane ride (less than 30 minutes gets us to this country that is carved out of the middle of Senegal.

Although it is the rainy season, we had encountered little rain in Senegal and virtually none in Dakar. However, it’s a different story here in The Gambia. The rains are definitely upon us. At times the rain beats down so hard it is difficult to hear.

We travel to Kaira Nyining Federation, which is a short drive from the CCF Gambia National Office. By the time we arrive, the rains have stopped. The mud, however, is everywhere and we step carefully.

The rains create a good backdrop, though, for the morning’s presentation. “It is very appropriate to have so much water today,” Anne says, “because water is life and the youth are the life of the community.”

We are in the federation’s building and in the front sit the community’s leaders. In the back are the youth. One day soon, those same youth will be sitting in the front as the leaders of the community. These youth are part of the Combo East Youth and Children Development Association.

Omar Cham, a youth who is active in the association, gives an overview of the highly successful program. He shares how CCF has assisted youth in a variety of capacities, including paying for school fees or building homes.

He notes, “As youth we believe in coming together to participate in support for our health. We don’t want to be school drop-outs. We have the opportunity to go to school, which is the key to life.”

He shares how many of the youth are involved in Junior Achievement, a program new to The Gambia, but one that is used in hundreds of schools in the United States. The youth also are exposed to information technology.

The youth also are participating in the first-ever youth and children cooperative credit union in the region. Currently there are 41 members. “We’re learning to save money,” Cham says. The credit union also gives them access to loans for their own economic empowerment and development.

Cham also talks about child protection and giving children a voice to speak out and reduce risk of violence and abuse. He said activities such as quizzes, debates and drama competitions help children improve their self-confidence and esteem.

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