YES-We did it again, this January 29-30, 2015, at King Solomon Hall in Arusha we hosted our Annual Programme Review. We established TFFT’s Annual Programme Review in the interest of learning and accountability. We use these action-packed sessions to share our progress and challenges of the previous year and to absorb ideas, lessons, and experiences from other stakeholders. This exercise helps us improve our service delivery and develop more appropriate solutions to education challenges and the plight of most vulnerable children (MVC).

It is always hectic coordinating partners, including civil society organizations, orphanages and children centers, private and NGO run schools, media, government officials, and beneficiaries. Nevertheless the value of the review stems from the multidisciplinary participation.

Over the course of two days, our program managers present an overview of their program, and in-depth discussions follow each presentation.

This year, among other topics, we discussed:

How best to expand engagement of guardians and their accountability in providing quality care to scholars?

What role should schools (together with other stakeholders) play in improving academic, behavioral and talent development in scholars?

How best can mentoring and coaching of scholars and teachers be leveraged through networks with stakeholders?

How do we sustain buy-in with Government and stakeholders to pilot the newly improved personality and Sports Development curriculum with schools following the successful baseline conducted by TFFT?

The most critical question to stem from the challenges in 2014 was:

How to effectively deal with the “allowance syndrome” and sustain teacher motivation in professional development?

We also identified our priorities for 2015:

• Develop the new strategic plan 2015-2020
• Piloting new projects such as Personality Development and Sports curriculum and Co-school management
• Media advocacy on MVC
• Expanding Household Economic Strengthening component
• Teacher motivation and mentoring
• Co-creation of learning and teaching resources and,
• Strengthening (with District Government) quality of care in orphanages and children centers in Meru District

We learned many lessons during the brainstorming session with boundary partners that we will strive to integrate. We see great opportunity for engaging media in advocating on behalf of the most vulnerable children. We will continue to work towards strengthening and formalizing partnerships. We will strive for joint coordination of teacher training and mentoring that will involve regular discussions with schools, guardians, and scholars.

TFFT is shifting away from service provision to developing and providing solutions to the key challenges that afflict most vulnerable children and education in Tanzania. We will integrate learning through technology, programming, pilots and studies to model innovations that inform change. We will increasingly work hand in hand with stakeholders (CSOs, Private Sector) and government as partners to scale up solutions to the twin problems of quality education and most vulnerable children.

We thank you all: My African Child, Mkombozi, AfricAID, Step By Step Learning Centre, Secondary Education for Girls’ Advancement, &Beyond, Seeway Tanzania, and many others whose ideas continue to inform our work.