A Week in Review: PhotoVoices, TVGs and ECD Centres

Good day, Ubunye Family!!

Welcome to our weekly roundup on the blog where we take a look at what happened during the week from the eyes of our social media representative.

This week has been filled with planning and review sessions, with each day bringing its own learning opportunities and fun moments. At the heart of it all (as always) – community leadership!!

Monday: PhotoVoices

I previously learnt what photovoices are and this week, I get to see it in practice. At the heart of the Ubunye are the communities who make up the organisation, and community-led mechanisms that enable people to speak directly on issues that concern them are vital – without the community, we hardly mean anything!!

People in the community take photos of what they see as representing the impact of the project on their lives and then record their description of the photo or what it means – it is a great form of data collection that personalises the data and allows us to truly understand the impact of the project on the person via their perspective.

Gathering, grouping and analysing the photos with their descriptions gives the community an accurate picture of the overall impact of their project and, best of all, it provides a colourful presentation that engages and interests the audience.

Tuesday: Tower Vegetable Gardens

The Tower Vegetable Gardens (TVGs) that are being grown in the ECD Centres around the community are a constant reminder of how a community can learn to become resilient and sustainble.

Early Childhood Development Centres are the centre of life in 45 villages in the Ngqushwa area. Both the ECD practitioners and parent body members have created TVGs at their centres.

These TVGs provide three key life giving services to the community.

First, they ensure each learner’s lunch is full  homegrown goodness; second, the ensure the villagers have access to the surplus veggies and seedlings; and third, the income made from selling this produce ensures the ECD centres can buy extra food stuffs they cannot grow.

It is a beautiful example of how a community can use their avaiable resources to help sustain themselves and their community. A full circle moment of planting your own seeds, nuturing and growing them, and in the end enjoying and reaping the rewards of all the hard work it takes to successfully grow vegetables.

Coming from someone who doesn't exactly have a green thumb, growing vegetables does take hard work, especially so in an area that is water scarce, so to do it successfully deserves recognition – especially because the produce is being put back into the community.

Wednesday: Happy Times

Some great news!!

The Ubunye Team has been constantly working to ensure that new ECD Centres are up and running and that they run smoothly.

I have been keeping progress on the beautiful new ECD Centre in Peddie that has been funded by the Eastern Cape Education Trust.

I went to the site a couple of times and it is honestly to heart-warming and quite breath-taking to see the progress from it basically being non-existent to it been a beautifully crafted building. It took a lot of hard work and clean-up session, and while there is still some work to do, the centre looks great and I know both the learners and practitioners will make great use of it.

Nothing better than providing a good foundation for the future generation!! It warms the soul.

Thursday: A Success Story

I don’t think we often truly appreciate the connections and people we get to meet through the jobs that we do. Through this internship at Ubunye, I have gotten the chance to meet some pretty incredible people both in the office and in the field who have taught me lessons I will take with me wherever I go.

Mrs Ngcana at Hlosini is one such person. She has followed the trend of her local ECD centre and has built her very own TVG. She now has two very successful TVGs!! – which are full of carrots, spinach and cabbages. She also has a vegetable garden with ready to sell spinach, cabbage, onions, beans, carrots, red and green peppers, and potatoes. This is a great example of community empowerment and uplifting the community – it shows that we can learn from others and help ourselves in return. Mrs Ngcana now has a sustainable business running, but it also feeding herself and her family at the same time!!

Conclusion

This week has been a blend of hard work and happy times. Each day brought its own set of joys, contributing to a week filled with learning. As we look forward to the next week, let us carry forward the enthusiasm that made this week so great.

Thank you for joining me on this journey through the week’s activities. Stay tuned for more adventures and insights in the next post!!