1. The Malawi Project at North Carolina A&T: Service, Mentoring, Achievement, Responsibility, Teamwork Liz Barber & Tom Smith

4. Malawi is the poorest country in the world, or tied for the poorest.

5. Devastating HIV/AIDS epidemic; 10 people die every hour. Life expectancy 38.5 for men, 37 for women. Yet Malawians remain hard-working and hopeful.

6. 91,000+ children living with HIV/AIDS, ½ million orphaned.

7. Malawi’s universal public education initiative started only in 1994.

9. Few schools and teachers. Many schools still under the trees.

10. Because teachers are in short supply, some have little more than a Standard 8 education, themselves.

11. Their pupils must pass high-stakes tests at the end of every Standard in order to continue in school.

12. Typically one textbook for every 5-6 pupils. Most lack paper or pencil, pen. Class size 100+.

13. Many starve when the rains don’t come, or come at the wrong time. Hunger is hardest on the young and the sick.

15. Malemia Primary School Child Feeding Program, now sustainable through pupils’ farming a school garden.

16. Libraries created & maintained in 3 schools.

17. Teacher-made HIV/AIDS Big Books written into national curriculum.

18. As his thesis, master’s student Brian Moseley co-designed a series of units in career education, which he returned to field-test. The units have been written into national curriculum.

20. Desperate need for Literacy in the Mother Tongue left many learners striving with little to latch onto.

21. We agreed to help teachers at Domasi Demonstration Primary implement LMT.

22. Teachers assessed LMT needs & co-planned for summers 2010-11. Chifundo Ziaya, Miriam Sherrif & Liveness Mwanza formed the school planning team.

23. Rotary Clubs in the Carolina Piedmont agreed to fund the LMT Project.

24. Commercial Big Books, blank Big Books, materials for making Big Books & supplies backpacks left teachers stunned: “Can we really keep these?”

25. The LMT class brought 100% of teachers, administrators from 3 schools. Joy is the word.

26. Across the month, university students, faculty assisted in everything from book selection to book-making to strategies for translating.

27. Teachers translated commercial big books into needed local languages.

28. Teachers use highlighter tape to help learners compare words across languages.

29. Lucy Kapenuka designed 3-language puzzles for Std. 1 children using TALULAR materials.

30. Yao speakers were at a premium: teachers valued each other in new ways.

31. Ruth created a much-needed Big Book on fractions, using flags from countries participating in the 2010 World Cup.

32. Student Michele Delgado “scribed” translations as a blind teacher dictated.

33. Gift Kawiza crafted a bilingual conceptual map.

34. Here’s the Yao.

35. It takes a global village, but the LMT project was launched, to be continued summer 2011.

38. Farming, raising chickens & sewing are all part of the Malawian curriculum from Std. 1-8. If the kids kept the accounts for both projects, would they be better prepared as entrepreneurs after Std. 8, when most end their formal schooling? Tailoring is a respected career for a man in Malawi; running a shop is respected for women.

39. Now we are seeking a chickens person, a sewing person, for 2011.

41. Malawian teachers & learners tell us: “Thank you for these things you have done to us.”

42. We hope we have done well.

43. Malawian children come to school with hope for a better future.

44. They make the most of every educational opportunity.

45. Through service, mentoring, achievement, responsibility and teamwork, is possible to make a world of difference.

46. Lives depend on it.

47. For more info contact: Liz Barber [email_address] Tom Smith [email_address]