Link Ethiopia update – February 2013

Our Annual Report for 2011-2012

Welcome to Link Ethiopia’s February 2013 News Update!

Our Annual Report for 2011-2012 was recently published and we are really pleased to share it with you in this update. You’ll find a few highlights below and much more information on our website.

Also this month we are advertising for architects and engineers who can help us with a major design project alongside our Ethiopian teams. Details are below. Let us know if you or someone you know might be interested!

Thank you again for your support!

Annual Report 2011-2012

During the year we made great strides forward in our work. We undertook a growing range of activities, from delivering improved facilities, resources and teaching to more Ethiopian schools and pupils, to enabling students in different continents to learn about each other and to share their aims and aspirations. We could not have done any of this without your help. Thank you for joining with us to ensure quality education is available to all children in Ethiopia!

Here are some very brief highlights of the year…

Read our Annual Report here

Read our Annual Report here

Our report is available to browse and download from our website here. We’d love you to see it and to find out more about how your donations are used to support education.

How we raised our money

How we raised our money.

How we spent your donations

How we spent your donations.

School links

School links

We now support 157 school links which is an increase of 65% on the previous year.

We worked with 111 primary school links and 46 secondary school links to develop their partnerships. We helped them to set up exchange visits, produced termly resource packs on global issues relevant to both countries and facilitated exchanges of letters and of shared learning activities around these themes. This year our linking theme was the Olympics and many schools exchanged ideas related to the Olympic theme of ‘hopes and aspirations’.

Child sponsorship

Child sponsorship

During the year we increased the number of sponsored children we support by 87%, to 144. Our sponsorship work now spans 14 schools in the north and south of the country. Sponsorship clubs are being established within each school as part of a review of the support we are giving to sponsored pupils and once this has been completed we will be launching a drive to find new sponsors to join the programme.

Volunteer teaching

Volunteer teaching

The volunteering scheme remains popular and caters for a wide range of ages and talents. During the year 21 volunteers taught in Ethiopia, primarily focussing on the teaching of English Communication Skills to secondary school students but also helping with computer training, sports coaching and giving teachers English tutorials.

In total these volunteers taught approximately 3,100 hours of lessons to approximately 1,000 students. There were fewer volunteers when compared with the previous year and we really want to find more! Get involved?

Projects

2011-12 has been an exciting year where we continued supporting our schools to deliver quality education for the needs of their community. We raised 33% more money for projects, which included…

  • 8 water and sanitation projects
  • 2 toilet cleaning projects
  • 5 classroom and furniture projects
  • 6 books and library projects
  • 2 football teams sponsored
  • 2 laboratory equipment projects
  • 2 technology projects
  • 4 teaching resources and teacher training projects

…. as well as ….

Donkey libraries

Donkey library expansion – we funded two mobile libraries serving 11 schools in rural areas in the north of Ethiopia.

Sports programmes

Sports programme – we provided football, basketball, volleyball and handball training for students in 7 schools, along with sports equipment and kits.

World Challenge projects

World Challenge projects – 7 educational expeditions enabled the building and stocking of a big library, a new water project, a new toilet block, and several gardening, painting and decorating initiatives.

Tour d’Afrique projects

Tour d’Afrique – the second visit by Tour d’Afrique cyclists enabled educational resource packs to be given to 104 students along with 10 bicycles to local schools.

Architects and engineers wanted!

Help us design our school building projects!

Are you someone with architecture or engineering experience, looking to get involved in international development work? Or do you know someone who is?

We are advertising a self-funded placement in Ethiopia to work with us to re-imagine and design our school infrastructure projects. The successful candidate would also get experience working on ‘live’ projects that will be happening at the same time. Our advert is published on our blog here – please let us know if you or someone you know might be interested. Spread the word widely!

To express interest, please email [email protected] and include your CV. Closing date for expressions of interest: 28th February 2013.

Some fun activities

Ethiopian Proverb - "A belt fastened while running will come undone while running."
English Proverb - "Gluttony kills more than the sword."

School Quiz

(1) When Ethiopia’s Emperor Haile Selassie spent some time in England in the late 1930’s, in which beautiful city did he reside? (2) What did ‘Operation Solomon’ and ‘Operation Moses’ mean to an Ethiopian in the 1980’s? (3) This ugliest of large birds can be always seen near the lake in Awassa, Ethiopia, scavenging for food on the ground or perched high on the very tops of trees. What is it?

The Conundrum:

Sitting with a friend and a nice cup of coffee in a street café in Ethiopia, this four letter word could either describe one person telling the other all about their interesting week, or it might be the rather unpleasant-tasting leaf that might be chewed at exactly the same time. What is it?

Photo of the moment…

Haile at Lalibela

Happy visitors the centre of attention on one of our Guest Tours. Join us?

Answers

School Quiz: (1) Bath. (2) Ethiopithiopia.an Jews being taken to Israel. (3) Marabou stork. Conundrum: Chat – a casual talk / a green leaf chewed as a mild drug in parts of E

 

A great big thank you to Campaign Monitor!

We’d like to say a great big THANK YOU to Campaign Monitor for supporting our work by providing us with this newsletter service for free.

Thanks for reading and best wishes from all the Link Ethiopia team!

You’re receiving this because you are one of our amazing supporters. Thank you for your help and encouragement.

Together We Learn - Ethiopia