Supporting education in Ethiopia Taking action

Supporting education in Ethiopia Working together with your partner school to make a change Ways of working in partnership: Investigate an issue together: Exchange information and discuss solutions. Decide on an action to take together, such as joining a campaign. Solve each other’s problems: Investigate the same issue in both your schools, such as water use. Swap information and see if you can suggest some solutions for each other. Make items together to raise money: How about a joint art exhibition? How about working on making cloth/jewellery together? How about designing banners and posters together? Campaign together: Discuss issues that are important to both your schools. Is there a global campaign you can join? Can you each lobby your local governments?

To fundraise or not to fundraise? Supporting education in Ethiopia

Benefits of fundraising Gives learners a chance to make a difference in the lives of others and get a sense of what they can achieve Opportunities for school wide involvement Encourages learners to think about issues and what they can do Provides a concrete goal to aim towards

Supporting education in Ethiopia Problems with fundraising Can reinforce stereotypes on both sides Can unbalance your partnership Can take energies away from the educational goals of your partnership Can give a simplified message of how we can solve all problems with money

Supporting education in Ethiopia Do you want fundraising to be a part of your partnership?

Supporting education in Ethiopia If so - how can you make sure your fundraising is good fundraising? Make decisions: Give learners a chance to decide which charity/issue to fundraise for, what events they want to do and how to publicise it. This builds their sense of how they can effect change as well as skills of communication, team-work and critical reflection Research the work of Link Ethiopia and other charities: Challenge your learners to investigate charity websites. What is the role of charities? How do they achieve their goals? How will donations be spent?. Include charities based in Africa, eg. The Commercial Bank of Ethiopia 10km race ( in which in ,000 Ethiopians and 260 international participants ran to raise money for local children’s charities. Think critically about the issues: What is development? Why is there inequality? What will really make a difference? How do we help people to help themselves? Are there other ways we can make a difference?

Supporting education in Ethiopia What other actions can we take to make a change? Change starts at home: Challenge learners to investigate issues in your own school. How fairly traded are the products in your canteen? How environmentally friendly is your school? Campaign on issues: Challenge your learners to investigate an issue they feel strongly about. Who is responsible? Could they write a letter to their MP or a business? Could they join a local, national or global campaign? Take practical action: What about volunteering locally? What about getting involved with a local environmental project? What about exploring ways of celebrating diversity in your local community? Involve your community: Challenge learners to spread the message about what they’ve learnt to parents and the school community. Hold an awareness-raising event and ask learners to come up with creative ways to get the message across.