Future Leaders Camp

All NAG efforts and staff members have been focused on preparing and running the first Future Leaders’ (FL) camp since the arrival of new recruits. The camp started on Saturday 24 September and ended on Wednesday 28 September. The number of FLs on the programme has increased substantially, going from 45 to 76, to ensure extensive coverage of the UGU district. An additional 5 FLs from the Ethekwini Municipality, funded by AECI in Partnership with Progression (disability equity specialists), attended the camp.

Day 3 of the Camp

The purpose of the camp was to introduce the FL programme to new recruits, administer technical skills training, and served as a way to connect old and new FLs. The team were work-shopped on, amongst other things, asset based community development (ABCD), governance and organisation development, facilitation skills, monitoring and evaluation (M & E), and how to carry out surverys.

But of course it wasn’t all business and no play. Team building activities are always a feature of the FL camps, and this year was no different. In additional to this, Nomusa Buthelezi, our NAG runner enthusiast, encouraged some FLs to join her in the mornings for yoga, aerobics, zumba and running. Other recreational activities, like table tennis, netball, pool and volleyball, kept the team busy when they weren’t learning in session.

Team Building Activity

Team Building Activity

There was a real of eagerness to learn at this year’s camp. Many of the FLs displayed an interest in being an agent for change in their communities and helping to shape children’s futures. FLs have a deep knowledge of challenges in their communities, in particular concerning ECD centres, and came up with some creative solutions to these challenges. The old FLs had the opportunity to share from their past experiences and learnings

The group worked very well together. The collaboration and conversation was rich and the creativity and comedy was endless. One of the facilitators exercised a community development theory that suggests that if you allow a community to own a process then they have the ability to step up and follow through. This is exactly what happened during one of the facilitation sessions at the camp.

The talent show was not short of talent this year, some of which included zulu dance, poetry, solo artists, plays.

Group of OVC volunteers; also present at the camp

Testimonial from Umdoni FL (Nondumiso Mbatha):

I enjoyed meeting new people and learning more about the future leaders programme. We started to visit ECD centres in our areas but had no idea what we should be doing there. However, now what is expected of us and understand our role in the ECD centres in terms conducting of monitoring and evaluation (M & E) and organisational development (OD).

Testimonial from Ethekwini FL (Gail Precious Miya):

The camp was very nice because we learnt a lot of new things and new terminology like what is meant by ECD, NPO and OD. We also learnt what you need to do when you visit and how to work in partnership with the organisations. The group from Ethekwini Municipality expected to see other people living with disabilities but on arrival, we found that this was not the case. However, this did not hamper the learning process or the group cohesion. In fact, everyone was very helpful and open. An interesting presentation was delivered by a lady from Brain Boosters. They suggest that kids mustn’t be overloaded with learning, that kids learn with pictures and other learning techniques. We were challenged to practice our presenting skills by doing group tasks. Each group was a given a topic to discuss and present back. The main take out for me from the camp was that we need to understand that we haven’t come to take people’s jobs or take over the running of the organisations, but that we are placed to  work in partnership with organisation and to develop their skills and facilitate learning by doing. I will be working with old age pensioners and I am so excited to get to work. The food was good, the water was hot, the camp was great!

Lessons for the Future

I joined NAG in 2012 as a future leader. This was the first exposure I received in working with community-based organisations (CBOs). The ins and outs of their operations and seeing first-hand how much effort and time the old ladies put into running their CBOs and partnering with NAG in an attempt to develop their rural communities. As a future leader, some of the lessons I took out was how to work with organisations, the processes they have to go through to register as non-profit organisations, as well as the needs and challenges they go through on a daily basis. I also learnt that although we talk about rural communities under one huge bracket, the communities we come from are all different. I would not have been able to appreciate this had I not been exposed to organisations from every corner of the UGU district.

In 2014 I was employed by NAG as a mentor to the future leaders. I served as a mentor to all future leaders (over 40) in the program, that is, conducting home visits, acting a facilitator in peer support groups and guiding them on organisational development. The transition from future leader to mentor was a smooth one. I found myself in a unique and favourable position because the future leaders respected that I understood their experiences and challenges on the ground. This made it a lot easier for the future leaders to relate and communicate with me.

In terms of the future, NAG has equipped me for success in my next venture because whilst at NAG I gained skills in people and relationship management, I received my driver’s license, and I had the opportunity to teach life skills and refine my teaching and coaching abilities. Far beyond these practical skills however, I learnt that work should not just be about remuneration; you should love you work and you should be passionate about what you do.

I can summarise my time at NAG as being a season of tremendous growth. I don’t have enough words to thank NAG for the great job, opportunities and experience. The love I received from NAG was remarkable.

Thank you

-Gavu

 

 

 

Dear South Africa

As promised at the end of 2015, our visitor from Germany documented her time with the Network Action Group (NAG) and has written a letter to share her experiences. She spent 3 weeks in the field with NAG staff and future leaders. We definitely enjoyed having her with us as she was willing to get involved with every aspect of the network and did so with enthusiasm and grace. Now, to hear from her directly…

Uschi and “1000” children

I truly miss you. You with your positive hospitable, lighthearted people, stunning natural beauty, chicken and fries at 10am and your irrelevance for time.

But first let me introduce myself; I am Uschi, 25 years old, born in Hungary and raised up each ten years in Austria and Germany. Studied international business and economic but the most important part me is that I am passionate about travelling. And when I say travelling, I am not talking about going on a 2 week, all-inclusive holiday in a 5-star hotel in  Thailand or South Africa. My definition of travelling is to dive into foreign cultures, be open minded about different values, willing to understand the people’s mindsets and learn as much about the country itself as possible. This time I finally made it to South Africa.

Back home in Europe we learn a lot about poverty in this country; we are told not to waste water and food, because there are so many children in the whole of Africa suffering from malnutrition and thirst. But I wanted to dig deep down to the roots of these problems, I wanted to understand why education is a constant issue, why HIV is spreading so quickly here why the gap between rich and poor is constantly growing wider and wider.

So I am not here to save Africa. I am here to comprehend its social and political situation, but most importantly, to understand the people, their background and their behaviour. And I had 3 weeks for that with NAG. So let’s get started…

Firstly, coming to NAG as a volunteer you won’t be put in one spot and take care of children for your volunteer time. They want you to experience and see their work and there are truly so many different things NAG is doing to be part of. It was a process for me to completely grasp how NAG works but the whole team gave its best and involved me in their work. Starting off with the future leader program, NAG gives motivated people, regardless their age, the opportunity to learn about life skills and later on to set goals, change their lives and bring their knowledge back to their communities. Future leaders are then responsible for enhancing the quality of crèches. Linked to this, NAG offers so called “psycho-social hours”. I had the chance to participate in one of these sessions which constituted talking and discussing in a small intimate about topics like violence in a relationships, which was a non-existing subject in my life so far, but is so unbelievably present in South Africa. but also about life questions like ‘what is love?’ and ‘how do I set goals in my life?’. I even had the chance to stay at a future leader’s house for a night. Spending the day helping out in the crèche of the future leader’s community, and the late afternoon and evening with the future leader’s family, was a great and interesting experience.

Another NAG project, in partnership with Ilifa Labantwana, is to locate and get crèches to be officially registered to provide the actual number of operating crèches to the state in order  to allocate government subsidies properly and to make the state take all the crèches into account calculating the subsidy amount but also to ensure child safety and security.

Fundraising meeting at NAG office

Since organisations such as NAG, that is, non profits, are a lot about fundraising especially when the company is constantly growing, I also had the opportunity to look into NAG’s financial and organisational structure and took part in a meeting with a potential donor.

Fun part of South Africa; they love to celebrate, to eat and they are deeply in love with their braai’s (= barbecue). I got the chance to experience that at NAG’s YEP(=year end party, quoted Msizi) which was all about celebrating life and NAG, but especially all NAG members and their achievement. Besides that I think I have never seen so much meat and food in my whole life!

Family Camp in KwaNziwakwe, Hibiscus Coast

In the end of my time at NAG I was lucky enough to take part in the so called ‘family camp’. That weekend is built for families with every kind of family issues. They are meant to talk about topics like ‘what is a father’s role in a family?’, ‘what is important when raising a child?’ or ‘what should I, as a kid, be responsible for and not?’. Those days are a very intense time for all the family members, a lot of hidden individual stories and issues come to the surface and NAG stuff listens, mediates and gives advice for solutions.

Leaving NAG and going back to one’s real life can be tough; suddenly a lot of daily issues and your work seem irrelevant. But it also teaches you not to take sheltered family circumstances, education and a lot of other things for granted. I learned that in South Africa it’s not all about the money but all about the right education, to make it accessible for everyone right from crèche time until college. NAG is not just another place where one can volunteer and leave with nothing but cute baby pictures. It’s about getting invited to ones’ grandmas’ birthday, sleeping at future leaders’ homes, being forced to get used to South African timing, eating fries at 10am, listening to moving life stories, going to places in the middle of nowhere, getting history lessons, learning to drive with very old cars, also playing a little bit with children of course, eating braais, but most importantly, seeing people make real changes to others’ lives and their communities.

What is left to say? Thank you NAG, special thanks to Zola, Brian, Thembi, Sphi, Nondumiso, Msizi, Phume, Maria, Sithembile and Gcinile.
Keep on doing those great life changing things and I will come back, hopefully soon!

Love,
Uschi

Uschi (Volunteer), Msizi (NAG staff), Phume (NAG intern)

Looking Back and Moving Forward

Last year was not without its challenges, we saw the rise and demise of certain or Community Based Organisations, we lost and gained Future Leaders we had grown to love and admire and we were pushed into the tightest of corners where we were forced to stop and just untangle ourselves.

As a network working with hundreds of organisations and government departments, it is imperative that we allow our work process to flow within the office space and that each staff member is clear about their responsibilities and those of their co-worker. 2015 was a year of strengthening those bonds, re-strategizing and reviewing internal and external approaches to the work.

We welcomed a few new staff members mainly for the Information Management System program and the integration process was as smooth as can be. With interns, it was ups and downs and we learnt a great deal about the responsibility of mentoring and monitoring. We have also seen the numerous programs that are both facilitated and run by NAG taken from various pilot phases and mature in their own right.

What I am getting at is that the lessons learnt in 2015 are those that will help us create a stronger network within NAG and our numerous stakeholders and allies in 2016 and the years to come. With a new year we uphold ourselves to new excellence. We renew our dedication to the community of UGU district and KZN at large and all those we work with and represent. We will not be deterred from our vision and our goals as the plot thickens.

Thank you for the relentless support and here’s to a new year

Happy 2016

Network Action Group.

Travelling Stranger

NAG office has been a hub for visitors in recent months; from other local Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) like Ubunye Foundation, to Italians, Irishmen and now a German-Austrian. Uschi landed on South African shores on Saturday 14 November and has been thrown right into the thick of NAG affairs. Coming from a well-traveled background across North and South America as well as Asia and Europe, Africa was always going to be a destination for her. Uschi has shared that she has always been interested in the African continent and our objective expose her to all the NAG programs so as to gain a more holistic and truer view of the state of the nation. She will however, be spending a larger proportion of that time with the future leaders team. We look forward to hearing some of her observations and thoughts from her time in South Africa which will be published at a later date.

Future Leaders On The Move: A story a time. 1

My name is Mandisa Shomela. I am a Future Leader at Network Action Group. I want to share the story of my personal development and how that impacted my community.

When I became a Future Leader last year October, I was not sure what was expected of me. I was not the most confident of young people but if sitting at home doing nothing gave me anything, it was a willing heart.

As a Future Leader I monitor 5 local ECD’s that I volunteer at and an elders luncheon club. Over the months I have learnt how to help CBO’s keep their organisations on track and in line with various NPO compliance requirements and organisational development. I also have an obligation to monitor and assist ECD’s implement trainings.

When I started work I did just what I had to do. But after various life skills trainings and camps I learnt so much about taking initiative and fully applying myself to the work I do. I had learnt a thing or two about facilitation and the relevance of icebreakers and the power of communicating your ideas.

I started seeing things anew and things I never cared for began to bother me. For example in the luncheon club I volunteered at, I began to notice the old people who were not involved in the handcraft activities just sitting around and waiting for lunch and going home. I then suggested to the leaders of the organisation that we start some kind of activities that will keep them active and involved. The idea was welcomed with great optimism which made the implementation an easy process.

The participants have shown great enthusiasm and come back with testimonials of being in better physical condition then they used to be. That kind of feedback is encouraging and heartening for a young person such as myself. I am constantly surprised by how much I learn and feel confident to implement back home.

Self-Actualization

Psychosocial Meeting at Mzumbe

Everything has a starting point, and every life has a beginning but our beginnings are never the same. Though everyone has the potential to create their own life story and carve their path, we must always remember that the tools we have been handed are not the same. Some people are handed fully fuelled tractors while others are given shovels that don’t have handles, and the range from one end to another is very wide and subject to interpretation.

This is what we have to consider when we work with a community. Trying to help people work with what they. It became apparent to me as I was reflecting on the progress that we have made in the Future Leaders psychosocial program that without being aware, I had pre evaluated the Future Leaders onto Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs. That being the basis of the rest of the counselling and psychosocial process.

Having started the sessions on family history and values, it helped us all reflect on the choices we have made and their vices and virtues. The implication of being fatherless or raising your mother’s children after she passes away or while she drowns herself in alcohol. What can that do to a developing human being? The deprivation of love and security while fighting for food and shelter, how can that hinder or enhance growth in different areas? More importantly, however, how does is it shape your self-worth and what toxic behaviour does it normalize?

We (facilitators and Future Leaders) then went into a series of sessions on relationships. We all wrote anonymous letters to our ex-boyfriends and girlfriends. This was to survey the landmines we might get ourselves into.  The letters were shuffled and each one was read out loud in turn. Horror quickly turned into laughter and laughter into tears as we all repeatedly listened to stories that appeared to belong on some TV true crime channel. These stories should not have been authored by the dear the people in this room yet everyone could relate somehow to every letter.

Life Skills at Machi

For the second session we prepared case studies on a few letters that carried reoccurring themes from the other 50 letters we had read. The rooms were often thick with mixed emotions in the beginning but with everyone having enough time to express their opinion and relate to the letter in their personal experience, disagreements simmered, judgment lowered and there was a sense of perception widening.

We as facilitators did not come to save the Future Leaders, we did not come to tell them what is wrong or right in their lives. We came to listen, ask reflective questions and share our experiences and how we viewed certain behaviours fabricating certain outcomes. We considered family histories once more in an attempt to find inherent relationships between upbringing and current beliefs. When sessions were concluding, we all spoke about what we took from the session and it seemed like people reflected during the sessions and wanted to improve their own circumstances and not let life happen to them or let their children ever go through the same victimization and think it’s acceptable.

Future Leaders camp concert rehearsal

Saying no to physical and verbal abuse or testing for HIV was among the top reflective outcomes. We all know that this is a journey and not a destination and it is easier to fall backwards than it is to push forward hence we promote peer accountability and our phones are constantly on standby.

It also occurred to me that some Future Leaders had no idea there was something such as family planning. They thought there was no way around having children you did not plan for. We had discussions about the various methods to prevent undesired pregnancies. There is nothing to “obvious” or too basic to discuss when we come from such diverse upbringings.

There is no one hierarchy, nor can there be. The concept is universal but the hierarchies are personalized. We can’t look at people and rate them according to our expectations, then when the shoes we put before them does not fit we ridicule them and make them feel incompetent.

Life Skills Santombe

NAG gives all it has to the Future Leaders. NAG gives them a volunteering opportunity to improve certain life skills while assisting their communities. It gives them stipends to assist on living costs and gives them constant trainings which are a tremendous growth experience. On top of that, the future leaders can rely on each other and have psychosocial for emotional support and a safe haven to express what they are going through. Holistic growth gives our future leaders a chance to reach their own self-actualization.

The Journey Must Go On.

Life Skills graduation with Nelly.

It has been four months since the future leaders team refreshed the program and added some crucial elements to its content. The last four months have proven to be an exceptional period for both the Future Leaders and the staff team. Ploughing through uncharted territory has proved to be both challenging but tremendously rewarding.

Machi Life Skills lead by Sthe

The newer elements that were auxiliary to the already mind expanding and character building Future Leaders program were psychosocial groups, video tracking and an HIV support group. All of these were added to improve the holistic growth potential of the Future Leaders, where they are viewed not just as volunteers for NAG at Community Based Organisations and UNISA students but also as people with psychosocial elements to address.

One of the core principals in this approach has been to establish a sense of individualization in a team setting. We have seen Future Leaders step up and form a choir that is full of life and excitement, we have seen Future Leaders take lead in meetings and facilitate their own ice breakers and claim their worth and space in a shared environment. All of that being done without stepping on toes. We have also seen an emerging culture of brotherhood and sisterhood and both personal and peer accountability.

Sane demonstrating workflow board at AGM

Many of the Future Leaders have shown improvement in their work ethic. Meaning that the Community Based Organizations they serve are making administrative and at times logistical progress which in-tern improves the services provided to the community. That is a great deal dealt with by Nelisiwe Rabukana and Nosipho Gumede. They work tirelessly to asses and fuel the Future Leaders while guiding them as to what is expected of them, then help them achieve it.

The journey has not been without its challenges, tireless working and constant affirmation and rectifying. The psychosocial process has been an adventure that Sthembile and I ventured on four months ago. Little could have prepared us for what lay ahead. That being said, we had the brilliant Maria Liggett on our side to guide us and help us regroup our minds.

The ever gentle and smiling Sithembile

The journey has been filled with tears, uncontrollable laughter, confusion and a growing sense of closeness. There has also been a reciprocated principle of respect. We have learnt that we are all flawed humans and we need to support each other. We all carry burdens and no one’s problem is more special than the other’s as everyone’s pain is real to them. We reach out through one on one counselling and everyone has a story, we share similar traits but our circumstances are tremendously unique.

The journey continues. We are growing stronger, all of us, the staff team and the Future Leaders. We are finding our feet, our place and our voice together. Strong relationships for a strong program.

We go on camp again this week and we are all so excited. To learn more, to love more, to live more.

Me changing a tire with Msizi. Team work. But he looks concerned with the way I am holding that spanner. 🙂

Life Skills Camp

We held a Future Leaders Life Skills camp last week. I will let two of the Future leaders share their experience versus their expectations.

I am Mary Dube from Izingolweni. When we were invited to camp as Future Leaders there was a sense of reluctance as some of us are primary care givers in our homes and some of us have small children and elderly parents to look after. There are many of us since psychosocial groups emerged who longed for camp and extended contact with our peers. We yearned to hang out and unify the group for a collective learning experience. so there was a divide in eagerness.

Mary and Phakamile on wheel barrow.. I will be your legs if you will be my arms.

Camp panned out to be an exceptional experience. Even those that were not too keen on camp put down their guards and embraced the experience. I as the adult in my house hold enjoyed the chance to reboot my self-esteem with peers who understood and others who could relate to my situation and pressures. It was so energizing, so revitalising and refreshing. It was like breathing fresher air, maybe the ocean had much to do with that.

The life skills course content was relevant and not excessive. I personally reflected a lot to conflict management and even more so to the phenomena known as internal conflict. I identified patterns that I could personally relate with and how that possibly hindered my communication in general.

Self-esteem activity facilitated by Sthembile Gavu.

I look forward in improving myself on a daily basis, not just for those around me but for better personal satisfaction. I am excited about my life and my potential.. Hahahahahah Zola hates the word potential, in the Goal Setting session she facilitated she took 10 minutes to discuss her discomfort regarding the word. She was hilarious but had a point. But yes I am ready to transform my potential into a visible and tangible achievement thanks to sessions lead by Sthe, Nosipho, Zola and Nompumelelo ranging from topics such as Communication to emotional Maturity.

I am however glad that we have psychosocial meetings, that way when hope begins to fade we can come together as brothers and sisters and reboot.

Nkululeko Luna after relay.

My name is Nkululeko Luna. Hahaha, well I don’t know what to say hahaha.. Ok so I am shy, no, let me rephrase, I was shy but camp slapped the silly out of my shyness.. It all came to me during Sthembile’s session about self-esteem, though she did not infer it, it occurred to me that my shyness was a defense mechanism and mask, protecting the fragility of my self-esteem, so I figured the less I said the less a chance people would notice me or think little of me. I was hiding in the shadows. There are shy people or quiet people and that is ok, but I am not shy, I was just ruled by what others would say about me. After that session all of that fell away and I made conscious decisions to voice my opinion in a group and speak up when spoken to. It feels so good to be real and unapologetic.

The wrath of load shedding during dinner prep time

As for the activities, can you say Wet and Wild. Seeing our sisters run and fall for the team was just moving and I cannot imagine a more bonding experience. Carrying each other to the finish line. When we were physically falling apart our team found strength with each encounter with the ground and helping hand. So much accountability was in play through-out the whole camp, from keeping time to working together as a team in the kitchen and activities to the evening choir sessions. Zola got upset with us a few times because we did not always get it right. We ran late, we served food late, we came to sessions late but she made sure we were aware that it was unacceptable if we desire respectability in the real world.

Sthembile Gavu in action

We are still not there. But we are definitely as a group and individuals acquiring more and more strengthen and confidence and the will to desire.

Lean on me or fall with me

Mary for her team

Hesitant Sizwe feeling up the water before he fills up.

Nomusa racing to the finish line

Birthday treats for Nkululeko junior

“There is no better way I could have spent my birthday”

Sane taking leadership and unavailing her talent to the group as a song writer.

Hoola relay… They came in last …… But they sure had a good time.

Relay , Gcinile and Sphumelele

Nomfundo searching for candy in flour.

Went to the beach without intention to be wet.. but we followed our hearts.. Thapelo, Zola and Sizwe.

United we stand.. Group pyramid.

Annual General Meeting. (The FL’s Contribution)

The signing in of the Nag members.

More signing in and collecting Annual Report Posters.

Program presentation s on display stalls (ECD)

Display stalls

Demonstrations

The que

More demonstrations ( Organizational Development)

Stall chats

FL program presentation by Sthe, Lulama and Sane

Choir backstage

Nag FL’s jamming on stage

Attentively or not listening.

The cutting of the cake

Dishing cake

Serving cake

The rest of the cake goes to………………………………….

On The 21st  of July which presented it’self as this Tuesday, Network Action Group hosted its 15th AGM. The Future Leaders team was responsible for the general ushering, entertaining and serving during the event. Everyone played their part and beyond to make it a successful event. There was singing , clapping, dancing and cutting,serving then eating of cake.Here are some photos to share the experience.