During my stay in Dar Es Salaam I paid a visit to the main office of the Children's Book Project. This unique project has achieved many great things and continues to grow. I interviewed CBP Director Lipangala Minzi and went to one of their successful projects, Mwenda Pole Primary School just outside of the city. In many ways this school can be seen as an example for the rest of the country. Have a look!
When their day at school is over, these children do not break out their brand-new Game Boy or Xbox. Most fetch water from a well, or milk cows tied up in ramshackle stables─a square of wooden fence─or collect fresh-laid eggs. But others go to the library to borrow picture books. The books are shelved by level of difficulty, and written in Tanzania's two official languages, English and Kiswahili. Children can even sprawl on the carpeted floor and read in comfort. "We could have set up chairs, as in a classroom," the librarian explains, "but we preferred to create a more relaxed environment that will encourage children to read."
This relative abundance of material is very rare in the region. It has allowed pupils at Mwenda Pole Primary School continually to improve their grades over the past four years. They can thank the Children's Book Project (CBP), a Tanzanian NGO devoted to publishing and distributing local literature─a blessing in a country where even history books come from Western countries. In 1997, CBP noticed that boxes of donated books sometimes remained untouched for months. CBP concluded that it was not enough to make resources available. They also had to be used effectively. CBP began training teachers to do just that. It was an enormous challenge. Basic evaluation techniques, such as book reports, seemed like quite an innovation at the time.
CBP is funded by CODE, an Ottawa-based organization. CODE builds on local initiatives in its nine countries of focus, promoting education in Africa and Central America. In Tanzania, CBP has another partner, the Tanzanian Book Support Trust (TBST), founded in 1999 to liaise between international donors and schools in need. TBST volunteers are generally responsible for selecting books likely to interest both teachers and pupils, from a list suggested by American and Canadian publishers. The books are shipped by boat, stored in a warehouse, and resold for 1/20th of their cost. Subjects range from mechanical physics to a collection of novels for teenagers.
This film is made by Bram Vergeer from the Holland based InSideOut Foundation. It, together with many more films, can be seen on our website www.insideseries.com. Our aim is to present a different view on the daily life of people in countries all over the world, especially in countries which in our opinion are being portrayed in a limited way by the common media. We do this by making documentary films, developing a series of short films mend for the internet (the Inside Series) and stimulating filmmakers across the world. We depend on donor funding and sponsorship. For information please visit our website or contact us through bram@stichtinginsideout.nl
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