Programme Quality Conference, Tanzania

This week all the Restless Development Programme Managers and Monitoring & Evaluation Managers in the nine countries that we work in met in Dar Es Salaam for our annual International Programme Quality Conference. It was great to see a lot of familiar faces and meet some new ones. It's always good to put a face to the name of someone you've been emailing for months!

The main aim of the conference was to bring the whole Programme Quality Unit together and bridge the gaps between the programme design/implementation stages of our work (traditionally carried out by Programme Managers) and the monitoring/evaluation stages (usually led by our M&E Managers) - the idea being that it's all a cycle of Programme Quality and all stages of the process are dependent on each other. 

It was a jam-packed schedule, with some sessions focusing on capacity building for specific stages of the Programme Quality cycle and other sessions providing an opportunity for practice sharing where various countries did presentations on different aspects of their work. I co-facilitated some of the sessions on programme design and led the practice sharing workshops. It was really interesting to hear in detail about some of the work we're doing as well as have the opportunity to see how similar models could work in different countries.

Goals and Approaches session for Programme Design

Brainstorming with Jalloh

Programme Design group work

On Tuesday we all had the opportunity to go on a range of field visits to see first-hand some of the work that our Tanzania team is doing. One group went to see a Youth Resource Centre, another met with some of our partner organisations, and another visited some Youth Camps where we are supporting young women to start their own businesses, making and selling jewellery and accessories. I was in the group that met with some of our alumni (ex-volunteers) to talk to them about their continuing role with Restless Development and their plans to be involved in the review of the National Constitution. Exciting stuff!

Meeting with Restless Development Tanzania alumni

Feedback session on Field Visits

On Wednesday we managed to escape the hotel in the evening and head out to the beach for drinks, dinner and some dancing. According to the "Entertainment Director" (aka James from Sierra Leone) we were all meant to teach the rest of the group a traditional dance from our country. There were some very impressive numbers from India, Uganda and Zambia but I'm not sure the UK office's rendition of the Hokey Cokey really matched up. It's the effort that counts, right?!

International dance class from Zambia

Teaching the Hokey Cokey

Kilimanjaro beer with Laura and Robyn

On the last night of the conference we headed out again for more dancing (no Hokey Cokey included) and said our goodbyes as the first departures were early Sunday morning. It's good to know I'll see James and Jalloh back in Freetown and will be seeing the South Africa and Zambia teams when I do my support visits in April and May. 

Ready to head out on last night

PQ ladies!

Last night dancing

It's been a great week, but I'm exhausted, and really looking forward to a whole week off. I'm going to be staying with friends on the Msasani Peninsula in Dar and recharging my batteries before I head back to Freetown. Kate (Programme Manager in Nepal, who has also tagged on some leave) and I have already made plans to go to Bongoyo island for the day on Monday and booked ourselves in for body scrubs and massages on Tuesday. Can't wait!

Last day of Sierra Leone Phase #1

I'm just about to head off to Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania for our International Programme Quality Conference, but have managed to cram loads into my last day of Phase #1 in Sierra Leone (I'll be back again after the conference).

Started the day with an early meeting with our Management Committee in Freetown to select, analyse and prioritise the policy problems generated in the workshop on Monday. The problems we chose will form the basis of the action plan I'll be working on when I come back for Phase #2 so it was exciting to see it all come together. Photos below.

I was really pleased to meet with the Policy and Campaigns Manager from Leonard Cheshire Disability this afternoon. Before I started at Restless Development, I did a consultancy there and got to know about a great programme they run called "Young Voices" which is all about young people with disabilities campaigning for their rights through the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities. They have lots of experience in engaging young people in policy and advocacy work so there is a lot of crossover with the work we do, and I'm looking forward to introducing them to some of our team and exploring possibilities for shared working when I get back from Tanzania.

I thought I'd finish up with a few photos that I've taken round and about Freetown over the last 3 weeks. It's a difficult place to describe, so I'll let the photos do the talking!

Overlooking the harbour from Fourah Bay College

Overlooking the central part of Freetown from Fourah Bay College

Central Freetown

Street vendor in central Freetown

Road heading out of Freetown

Lots of construction work

Funky wall art on my walk on the way to the office

Freetown by night - no street lights!

Policy Workshop and Valentines HHH

Today was the first day of a three day National Programme Quality Workshop at the National Stadium in Freetown. Although there was already a jam packed schedule planned, I was really fortunate to be able to get a half day with all the Programme Coordinators and Field Officers from the different districts we work in in Sierra Leone - it's a rare opportunity to get them all in the same place so I didn't want to miss out!

The workshop I facilitated was all about one of Restless Development's new strategic approaches called "Shaping Policy and Practice" which I have been working on since I joined the organisation. Traditionally, we've been a very service delivery type of organisation, based on our core volunteer-led programme model which means young volunteers become peer educators (in areas such as sexual health and life skills) to other young people. All great stuff which we still do, but we're now recognising that this kind of approach leads to incremental change (dependent on individual to individual contact) rather than more transformative change (that goes to the root of a problem and tackles it through a more systemic approach). So this often means finding out which policies don't exist (or do exist but are not being implemented) and designing programmes that aim to influence the decision-makers (government, donor or private sector) who have the power to change them. So today's workshop was a mixture of capacity building (so that our teams better understand what the new approach entails) and problem brainstorming to identify what are the main policy problems facing young people in Sierra Leone today. It was great to hear all their ideas and how passionate they are about addressing the issues. 

In the evening it was the Valentines Day run with the Hash House Harriers so we all dressed up in red (some taking it to extremes - see below) and went running in an area heading out of Freetown. At one point I realised that everyone we ran past was shouting "APC APC", which is the name of the ruling political party in Sierra Leone (All People's Congress). Apparently red is their campaign colour. Probably not the wisest of moves during a potentially turbulent election year?! Maybe we'll even it on a St Patrick's Day run in green, the opposition party (Sierra Leone People's Party, SLPP) colour?!

Long days (and nights)

This morning I was up at 6:30am talking to a pineapple, practising what I wanted to get across/get out of my 9am meeting with the Governance Adviser at DFID (UK Department for International Development). That's not a sentence I thought I'd ever be writing, but needs must. 


With a lot of our office out on field visits this week I haven't been able to run any internal workshops or group sessions so I've been busy setting up and attending external meetings to identify opportunities where our Civic Participation work could fit in with what other organisations are already doing/plan to do. Think the DFID meeting went really well (thanks to the pineapple practice?!) and it looks like there are lots of possibilities to follow up on, including one that links some of the work we've been doing on empowerment and accountability initiatives with DFID in London. 


Had a really big IT breakthrough today when Outlook finally worked!! I cannot begin to describe what a difference it makes to be able to download emails (when the internet is working) and then work on them offline. It means I'm not so reliant on the internet working throughout the day as long as it comes on enough to send and receive at various points. So I spent the rest of the day catching up on emails, following up from this morning's meeting and planning for the upcoming Programme Quality Conference in Dar Es Salaam (Tanzania) at the end of February. I've felt so in the dark about so many things that I'd usually be really clued up on, so today it was like someone turning on a lightbulb to be able to get back up to speed. 


I didn't get home till 7pm and was just trying to figure out what I had in the flat to eat (an onion, some pasta, 2 tomatoes and a pineapple - yes the same pineapple from this morning) when Mr and Mrs Jabba invited me in to join them for grilled mullet, tabbouleh, hummus and Lebanese flat bread. I heart the Jabbas. Really kept me going all night while I was working on a report for the National Youth Commission on the role/capacity of District Youth Councils. I am really tired and it just seems like there aren't enough hours in the day, but I'm looking forward to a day off tomorrow, eating croissants and drinking coffee at Bliss before joining Jem and Chris (who I met through the Open Mic night at O'Casey's) for an afternoon guitar/ukulele jam session. Hopefully with beer. Over and out for the weekend...

Mr and Mrs Jabba, "feeding me up" (as she says!)

Meet the Sierra Leone team!

Today I thought I'd introduce some of the team in our office in Freetown. It's not everybody, as I'm learning that it's very rare that everyone's in Freetown at the same time because so many of our programmes are located in other regions and managed from field offices all over the country. But hopefully it'll give a flavour of the office environment and some of the great people I'm working with, as well as some of the surrounding community(!)

With Mr Mansour, the tailor next to the office. He's going to make me an African dress once I buy some material 

Josephine (with her daughter) who I buy my bananas from everyday

The Youth Leadership and Advocacy Team - James, Quentin and David

Ahmed, Finance Coordinator/aka the boss man (-;

Mahmoud, the IT guy who got my Outlook to work. He's my bud

With Kebbie, who has a unique skill for bringing me tea and chilling me out just at the moment I want to throw my computer out the window. Don't know what I'd do without him! 

James - Monitoring and Evaluation Manager/aka Logframe King!

Jalloh, Youth Leadership and Advocacy Programme Manager

The ladieeeeeeeeeez (in a very male dominated office!) - Juliette (Office Security/my Krio Teacher) and Fatthi (Administrator/my Sierra Leonean Fashion Guru)