Rwamwanja BTVET Training Centre–Finn Church Aid (FCA)
Category: UGANDA
Work Process Summary
Rwamwanja BTVET Training Centre–Finn Church Aid (FCA)
The project was implemented by Finn Church Aid (FCA) in Rwamwanja Refugee Settlement, Western Uganda. The refugee settlement is mainly home to Congolese Refugees, mainly from Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
How students were selected: The project begun in February 2021 with identification of students to participate in project activities. A simple criterion was used to aid the selection process. Through this criteria, the project targeted youths aged 15-25 years, living in Rwamwanja refugee settlement (refugees), youths of the Rwamwanja ‘host community’, and former trainee of the Rwamwanja BTVET Training Center with demonstrated interest and commitment to the training program. In total, 16 students were selected including 10M, 6F; 13 refugees and 3 ‘host community’ youths.
Orientation on project activities: Orientation for all selected youths was held for one day. It focused on explaining what NGO Mondo is / what it does, explaining the project objectives and activities, agreeing on how to align the new activities within the BTVET Center IT Lab program, and scheduling meeting and training days. Engaging students in climate change related activities: The students were engaged every Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays in class workshops and related field study excursions basing on the lesson plan provided by Mondo as a guide. In addition, the students were engaged in the following activities:
- During the first week, students were introduced to NGO Mondo School Network Project; they were also introduced to the School Linking Blog(https://foodforthoughtmondo.wordpress.com/). Consequently, the students were able to use the school linking blog, and throughout the project period, the students used the blog to interact with their peers and learn more about global climate issues. The students, with support by trainers, were engaged in 3 groups to write three short introductions about themselves and selected one story that was shared on the school network linking blog.
- During week three, the students were introduced to Climate Change and related issues using the USAID Climate Change Fact Sheet as a guide to the discussion. In two groups of eight, the students discussed the fact sheet trying to relate it to personal experiences on local climate change issues and phenomena. A Cartoon Video (MAN by Steve Cutts: https://youtu.be/WfGMYdalClU) assisted the students to understand better the linkage between human activity, environmental destruction and climate change. In their groups of eight, the students wrote their own reflection, what they understood and thought after the Cartoon Video and their insights on the video were shared through the school network linking blog.
- For weeks four to six, students participated in creative writing and video editing. These were held using the workshop approach. Each student composed a small ‘climate and me’ story also remembered as a ‘life changing event’ they experienced, and shared with the group, while recording each story. Consequently, three short ‘climate and me’ videos were recorded and edited by the students themselves using smartphones. The three short videos were later merged into one video, giving the students the video-editing skills to edit separate video clips into one larger video. Since the videos were recorded in local languages, interpreters assisted to translate the students’ words into (by adding subtitles to the videos). Finally, the students themselves created a group YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCskxTYek5lU1bt1yLtmn8-g, where they shared their climate change video stories.
- Through week 8 and 10, the project supported students in collecting climate change stories from their communities. The students, supported by the BTVET Training Centre Instructors (teachers) visited different communities around the refugee settlement in Base Camp 1 and Base Camp 2 and shared with the communities on their experience and understanding of climate change and its effects. Students also recorded some videos with some of the community members as they shared their climate change stories.
- Lastly, a number of field workshops were conducted with groups of students engaging the local communities to find a number of climate change-related stories /events and/or phenomena. Consequently, two stories were chosen by the students for sharing on the school network blog. The stories were edited by students themselves. Since they were recorded in the local languages, the project engaged interpreters to provide subtitles in English so that the stories can be understood by other students around the world. The stories were shared on the group’s YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCskxTYek5lU1bt1yLtmn8-g)
Climate Change Stories
By Students of Rwamwanja
Hello There! Check out our climate change videos
Analysis of ‘Man’ Cartoon-Steve Cutts
By Students from Rwamwanja-Uganda
Man’s Activities specifically economic activities like cultivation, industrialization has destroyed our climate. An if something is not done to restore nature and strike a balance between Industrialization and Climate Change, Earth will end up in ruins, the last part where the aliens come and are not happy with MAN is simply because they found a wasteland instead of home they expected to find. In short the video tells us we have already done enough damage and as such we need to do something about it before we lose our planet to effects of climate change created by ourselves
Introduction From Rwamwanja BTVET
We are students from Rwamwanja BTVET Centre, Uganda. Our school is located in western Uganda and we are about 250 students both male and female ,Refugees and host communities. We are studying hands on skills in different courses such as AVET (Agriculture Vocational Education Training), Hairdressing, Tailoring, Mechanics, Blacksmith and Sandal making plus Computer skills. Our school is within Rwamwanja refugee camp where climate change has become a big challenge to us and natives at large. The weather condition in this place has totally changed in this case, we have been receiving rainfall in early February but now we are receiving little in late March. This is a very big problem because the biggest percentage of Us rely on Agricultural activities. Now it is high time as young students to focus on climate change and its effects, so that we learn about climate in and what we can do to help mitigate its negative effects.
We are happy and excited to participate in this project because climate change affects our daily life regardless of everyone’s status of living. We shall do whatever is possible to collect different stories on climate change and how it affects the people in the community, and there we shall come up with ideas on how we can control these negative effects of climate change.
Together with the community we can make the world a better place for mankind by creating a very strong awareness of our environment and controlling the activities that lead to negative climate change in the world.
Below are some of the negative effects of climate change that are affecting us as a community and individuals.
- Last year 2020, there was a shortage of rain and as a result, farmers’ crops were severely depleted, so food was very expensive,
- Farmers even now do not know the best time to plant crops, because the summer has changed its course,
- Cutting down trees for firewood reduces rainfall,
- Climate change leads to poor infrastructure development Such as roads, houses and hospitals, especially during rainy season,
- Climate have led to famine outbreak especially in mountainous area which have led to death of many peoples and animals leading to low population.
Students Discussing their Climate and Us Topics as a group after the first session of the project (Group Two)
Introductory Video
Food for Thought Mondo 