It's do or die time and all the members of our group are very excited for the walkathon, scheduled for just a few days from now. Joseph ole Tipanko, outreach director for MAGSA-OUTREACH, arrived in the United States last week. He arrived in DC this previous Monday after a trip to New York and the UN.
I finally met with Joseph on Tuesday. I recognized him immediately due to his ornate jewelry,and red robes. We exchanged warm greetings, and Tina drove us to campus so that we could drop off a large, and very heavy, bag of jewelry that was hand crafted by the women of the Maasai. We plan on selling the jewelry this Thursday (April 16th) and before the walkathon. Joseph began to attract attention as soon as we got campus as people approached him speaking Swahili and sharing stories of trips to Kenya. We priced out the large variety of hand crafted trinkets and discussed our schedule for the week.
I walked Joseph back to his host’s apartment and we discussed our respective cultures, homes and families. Our discussions were very insightful and I believe that he has a great amount of information to share with everyone about his unique culture. I am very excited for his guest appearance in Professor LeVan’s 11:20 class tomorrow.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Monday, March 30, 2009
Update 3/30/09
The walkathon, now officially scheduled for April 18th, is just under three weeks away and there have been some exciting updates and developments concerning the service project.
We tabled on the quad today between 2-5pm thanks to assistance from The Movement for Global Justice, a CASJ affiliated group. We handed out pamphlets on the Maasai people and MAGSA-OUTREACH and displayed traditional Maasai fabric. We also got 26 people to sign up for our listserv and aware of our walkathon.
We are also preparing to send our shirt design to the printing shop, pending final design approval by members of the group. We hope to have shirts available for purchase soon as we have been experiencing some difficulties in obtaining Maasai crafted beads.
Finally, we have contacted a member of APO, the campus community service fraternity, who will advertise our cause to members of the organization who are concerned with assisting communities abroad. Stay posted and we will make sure to keep you all up to date on the status of shirts, beads, possible musical acts at the walkathon and more.
We tabled on the quad today between 2-5pm thanks to assistance from The Movement for Global Justice, a CASJ affiliated group. We handed out pamphlets on the Maasai people and MAGSA-OUTREACH and displayed traditional Maasai fabric. We also got 26 people to sign up for our listserv and aware of our walkathon.
We are also preparing to send our shirt design to the printing shop, pending final design approval by members of the group. We hope to have shirts available for purchase soon as we have been experiencing some difficulties in obtaining Maasai crafted beads.
Finally, we have contacted a member of APO, the campus community service fraternity, who will advertise our cause to members of the organization who are concerned with assisting communities abroad. Stay posted and we will make sure to keep you all up to date on the status of shirts, beads, possible musical acts at the walkathon and more.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Raising Awareness and Efforts at Outreach
Our efforts these last few weeks have been focused on raising awareness and reaching out to other organizations on campus. The email I received from Joseph ole Tipanko had pamphlets from MAGSA-OUTREACH attached. We have begun printing them and handing them out. The pamphlet's contain interesting and important information about the organization, its goals and how donations help the Maasai community and should help to raise publicity for our project.
I have also been working with a member of CASJ, which has cosponsored our project, and has offered assistance in getting tables and putting fliers up. He will also try to get the word out to CASJ members. This includes a meeting I had with Student Advocates for Native Communities. I met with about ten of the organizations members, explained the goals of the service project and handed out literature and a sign up sheet. I am optimistic that this meeting and meetings with other groups like DCY will build upon our one hundred members facebook group.
I have also been working with a member of CASJ, which has cosponsored our project, and has offered assistance in getting tables and putting fliers up. He will also try to get the word out to CASJ members. This includes a meeting I had with Student Advocates for Native Communities. I met with about ten of the organizations members, explained the goals of the service project and handed out literature and a sign up sheet. I am optimistic that this meeting and meetings with other groups like DCY will build upon our one hundred members facebook group.
Friday, March 20, 2009
Update
In the past few weeks, I have been attempting to get in contact with various groups for co-sponsorship of our events. I sent emails to all the groups listed in the first post but have yet to hear back from any via email. However, a member of Tau Kappa Epsilon who did a service project with the Maasai last semester contacted me about possible co-sponsorship via the Facebook group I created regarding our project. In addition, Keith met with a member of The Community And Social Justice Coalition (CASJ) about possible co-sponsorship. We were also able to get in contact with a student who did the service project years ago who still has some beads that we can use to raise money for MAGSA-OUTREACH.
Another possibility I have been considering is asking my French teacher, Madame Breant, if she would be willing to perform at our event. She is from Cote D'Ivoire and sings about social injustice in Africa so hopefully she will be willing to help in some way.
Basing our plan on the checklist we got from the Community Service Center, the coming weeks will invovle:
Another possibility I have been considering is asking my French teacher, Madame Breant, if she would be willing to perform at our event. She is from Cote D'Ivoire and sings about social injustice in Africa so hopefully she will be willing to help in some way.
Basing our plan on the checklist we got from the Community Service Center, the coming weeks will invovle:
- Develop a budget for the coming weeks
- Come up with a reasonable goal for fundraising
- Finalizing the date of the walk-a-thon (pending confirmation from Joseph, we are hoping for April 18th)
- Gather the materials we need to print out flyers and begin handing them out and posting them
- Secure co-sponsorship
- Secure a table so we can hand out information and attempt to raise money
- Finalize t-shirt order
Friday, March 6, 2009
Community Service Center Trip
We went to the Community Service Center today where we got useful tips that should make our ideas become action. We explained our objective for this service project and our first event that we want to pursue in the next month.
The workers thought it was a great idea and gave us a guideline sheet with a checklist that had the fundamental steps for tackling a fundraising event like this one. The checklist included steps such as finding a budget, ways to publicize the event, group gatherings with members, etc. The guideline sheet is a great source for this project because it will help us to structure and organize this event, something which we were lacking.
The staff also gave us the contact information for other student coalitions that could give us advice as well as support for this event such as the student coalitions of Community Action and Social Justice and the Ethnic and Cultural Coalition. Our next step is to find where we are going to get the bracelets and T-shirts we are planning to sell. This will be done by next week and we will make some important decisions. Hopefully we can get the cheapest price possible!
-Agustina Del Carril
The workers thought it was a great idea and gave us a guideline sheet with a checklist that had the fundamental steps for tackling a fundraising event like this one. The checklist included steps such as finding a budget, ways to publicize the event, group gatherings with members, etc. The guideline sheet is a great source for this project because it will help us to structure and organize this event, something which we were lacking.
The staff also gave us the contact information for other student coalitions that could give us advice as well as support for this event such as the student coalitions of Community Action and Social Justice and the Ethnic and Cultural Coalition. Our next step is to find where we are going to get the bracelets and T-shirts we are planning to sell. This will be done by next week and we will make some important decisions. Hopefully we can get the cheapest price possible!
-Agustina Del Carril
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Contact with Jospeh Ole Tipanko
I have exchanged a series of emails with Joseph Ole Tipanko, the outreach director of the Maasai Good Salvage Outreach Organization. In my first email I introduced myself and the goals of our group. I also briefly described some of our ideas including the walk-a-thon and selling Maasai crafted beads. Joseph was very thankful for our offer of assistance and supportive of the ideas we had formulated.
Joseph sent us some literature on the Maasai in a follow up email. This detailed the plight of the Maasai, how contributions help their community and the projects and goals the MAGSA-Outreach Org. is currently working on. We plan on printing out a bunch of these pampheletes and distrubuting them in an effort to raise awareness.
I have also discussed obtaining some Maasai beadwork from Joseph's community but our plans on this are still pending, hopefully we will know more soon.
Joseph sent us some literature on the Maasai in a follow up email. This detailed the plight of the Maasai, how contributions help their community and the projects and goals the MAGSA-Outreach Org. is currently working on. We plan on printing out a bunch of these pampheletes and distrubuting them in an effort to raise awareness.
I have also discussed obtaining some Maasai beadwork from Joseph's community but our plans on this are still pending, hopefully we will know more soon.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Day 1
Our service project this semester is in collaboration with the Maasai Good Salvage Outreach Organization (MAGSA-OUTREACH), a group which aims to combat the socio-economic problems faced by the Maasai people of Kenya and Tanzania. First, some background on the Maasai people:
The Maasai are a semi-nomadic people who live under a communal land management system. They rely on livestock such as cattle, goats and sheep as their main source of food and income. Men usually assume the duties of hunting, while women are responsible for building their houses, supplying water, collecting firewood, milking cattle and cooking for the family. However, there are many problems facing the Maasai people as a result of lack of resources and government interference.
The MAGSA-OUTREACH website lists six broad problems facing the community: illiteracy and low education, lack of employment, high and rising levels of poverty, lack of provision of clean water, environmental pollution and desertification, and HIV/AIDS and tropical diseases. The Kenyan government has contributed significantly to the plight of the Maasai by converting areas of land into reservations and game parks. This denies the Maasai access to essential supplies of water and land. However, the Maasai people see none of the revenue gained from increases in tourism as a result of these projects, money that could be used to provide children with school supplies or educate women about the spread of HIV/AIDS.
These are only a few of the plights facing the Maasai. Our group’s primary focus is to raise awareness of these issues, in particular, the issues of education and the environment. We plan to do this through various service events during which we raise money and awareness.
We have many ideas for fundraising and are planning to do 2-3 events as well as things on the side such as selling t-shirts and beads. For our first event we are planning on doing a five-mile walk-a-thon. As you already know, the Massai women walk many miles just to get enough water for the day as well as Massai children have to walk enormous lengths to get to school. We would portray this daily routine in the walk-a-thon and make it symbolic by having our destination be at the river in Glover Park. We were thinking of preparing food or some thing that would be held at the goal marker in order to congratulate the people for signing up and paying for the walk-a thon as well as completing the walk. Before this event, we will be selling t-shirts to further promote people to sign up and we will wear these shirts at the walk-a-thon. The second event we are planning on doing is holding a talent show or an open mike in the tavern. There won’t be a cover charge however donations would be appreciated at the event. We would get an entertaining DJ and 10-15 performers for the night. For the third event we will hold a dodge ball tournament. We have not planned the details of this event however it would be held on campus and it would be 5 or 10 dollars to join. We would make a group over facebook most likely.
We think it would be effective to seek co-sponsorship for these events with groups on campus. Here is a list of some groups we thought would be willing to help:
The Maasai are a semi-nomadic people who live under a communal land management system. They rely on livestock such as cattle, goats and sheep as their main source of food and income. Men usually assume the duties of hunting, while women are responsible for building their houses, supplying water, collecting firewood, milking cattle and cooking for the family. However, there are many problems facing the Maasai people as a result of lack of resources and government interference.
The MAGSA-OUTREACH website lists six broad problems facing the community: illiteracy and low education, lack of employment, high and rising levels of poverty, lack of provision of clean water, environmental pollution and desertification, and HIV/AIDS and tropical diseases. The Kenyan government has contributed significantly to the plight of the Maasai by converting areas of land into reservations and game parks. This denies the Maasai access to essential supplies of water and land. However, the Maasai people see none of the revenue gained from increases in tourism as a result of these projects, money that could be used to provide children with school supplies or educate women about the spread of HIV/AIDS.
These are only a few of the plights facing the Maasai. Our group’s primary focus is to raise awareness of these issues, in particular, the issues of education and the environment. We plan to do this through various service events during which we raise money and awareness.
We have many ideas for fundraising and are planning to do 2-3 events as well as things on the side such as selling t-shirts and beads. For our first event we are planning on doing a five-mile walk-a-thon. As you already know, the Massai women walk many miles just to get enough water for the day as well as Massai children have to walk enormous lengths to get to school. We would portray this daily routine in the walk-a-thon and make it symbolic by having our destination be at the river in Glover Park. We were thinking of preparing food or some thing that would be held at the goal marker in order to congratulate the people for signing up and paying for the walk-a thon as well as completing the walk. Before this event, we will be selling t-shirts to further promote people to sign up and we will wear these shirts at the walk-a-thon. The second event we are planning on doing is holding a talent show or an open mike in the tavern. There won’t be a cover charge however donations would be appreciated at the event. We would get an entertaining DJ and 10-15 performers for the night. For the third event we will hold a dodge ball tournament. We have not planned the details of this event however it would be held on campus and it would be 5 or 10 dollars to join. We would make a group over facebook most likely.
We think it would be effective to seek co-sponsorship for these events with groups on campus. Here is a list of some groups we thought would be willing to help:
- African Students' Organization
- Alliance Of Students Against Poverty
- Eco-Sense
- Movement For Global Justice
- Nourish International
- Student Advocates For Native Communities
- Get in contact with Joseph Ole Tipanko, Group Projects Coordinator for MAGSA-OUTREACH, initiate a dialogue about our project, discuss the possibility of getting some beads made by the Maasai women so we could sell them as a fundraiser.
- Send emails to all the organizations listed above and see if they would be willing to co-sponsor any of our events.
- Find a company that can provide us with t-shirts for our project.
- Begin work on a design for the t-shirt
- Have a blog post up one week from today discussing our progress
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