At 65 years old, Elizabeth Mangani has been a farmer her whole life but, despite hard work 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, she has always been very poor and only just makes enough to feed her family. As a result, she had nothing to show as a progress in her life to her fellow villagers and had little respect in her community. Thankfully, her life took a different course when she joined the Tiseyere Village Savings and Loan Association (VSLA) group which...
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When change is taking place and you are one of those people who influence that change for a good cause you can’t hesitate to shout it loud. I am very proud to be a Join My Village officer. Yes! With my own eyes I have seen people’s lives changing for the better.    I was very excited when the Media Officer position was given to me back in 2010 because I very much wanted to hear and tell stories of change in people’s lives and to...
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Most of us must have participated in sports at some point of our lives. Sports for most of us represents an early attempt at discipline, coordinated physical as well as mental activity involving interaction and exchange with others to realize group, as well as individual, goals.    At Join My Village, we know that apart from being fun and participatory, sports also have a social dimension that impacts on the lives of our girls as they are growing up. It may sound surprising to some, that...
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As many of you will know by now from reading my blogs or visiting our website the Village Savings and Loan Association (VSLA) component of Join My Village is an important one.  Part of the VSLA concept is the identification of Village Agents (VAs) within the VSLA group members. Not only are Village Agents appointed to help train new groups in the VSLA methodology but also to continue helping newly formed VSLA groups, providing an important element of sustainability in the Join My Village program...
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Here are some of my thoughts on the high pressure of teachers. Whereas computers have a back-up system which prevents the loss of information, teachers are expected to know a large amount of information, but without any such backup. I have been told that teachers in the US have things like the internet to help them, but in rural schools in Kasungu teachers rarely even have as much as a dictionary to help them. So they really can be at a loss if they ever go blank or need more information.                    ...
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