#TeamAtoZed2016 Official Update - Week 1

That's Lisa Bennett, one of our volunteers. "We talked about everything from national monuments to food to 2Pac and Nicki Minaj," she says of the instant rapport she built with the children at Son Shine Primary School.

We’re excited to give you this update for #TeamAtoZed2016 of the international volunteers’ 20-day missions trip!   

The team arrived in Zambia on Tuesday, May 31, and since then we’ve experienced some ups and downs and we’re happy to share them with you.

As you may have already read in our previous posts, the A to Zed Mission is to provide support, supplies, and education to the teachers and students of local schools beginning in Zambia.

The schools that we’re working with this year are the Son Shine Primary School, a fee-paying school, where the co-founder of A to Zed, Lusungu, and volunteer Lisa will be working with teachers and students. We’re also working with The Lazarus Project, a community school where co-founder Kondi and volunteers Vanessa, Marcia, and Clavis will be serving. Matthew 25 Orphanage is an additional institution in Chilenje that A to Zed is supporting this year by providing supplies and interacting with the children. They will be invited to the guesthouse (where the team is staying) for dinner, empowerment talks, games, and surprises. “Our work with them is more service related rather educational,” says Kondi.

“This year, we will not be able to visit Shantumbu (another institution in need of many types of support) even though we wanted to. It was going to be something that we did in addition to all of the other work we’re doing with Son Shine and Lazarus,” Kondi adds. "A to Zed served them in  2014 and because of our full hands this year, the team won’t be able to go. That’s why in the future we’d like to travel with more small, intimate teams so we can serve more children."

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Help A to Zed serve more children in Zambia by  donating or volunteering.

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By building on common interests, the team is making great rapport with the children who seem to be well versed in American pop culture. "We talked about everything from national monuments to food to 2Pac and Nicki Minaj," she says of the instant rapport she built with the children at Son Shine Primary School.

Our team’s itinerary loosely looks something like this: Keep in mind the trip took about 3 days. “We arrived, went to bank took a day to get people climatized. Then we took a day to observe the schools, one public, another is an orphanage. That was a lot for the ladies to take in.”

A beautiful girl notices the camera at Lazarus Community School in Zambia. 

Kondi continues, “Then we took a few days to do cultural immersion, we visited Victoria Falls and after that everyone was refreshed and ready to work the next day.”

Monday, June 6, 2016 was the first full day of observation in the schools. When visiting a country that lacks the same infrastructure and resources in all areas such as running water and electricity for the first time, you must mentally prepare for major culture shock. “Emotionally there were lots of highs and lows. We identified opportunity-for-improvement areas, did self-reflection, debriefed during lunch and during dinner, we strategized,” Kondi explains. There isn’t much downtime during the 20-day trip. "It's not a vacation," she emphasizes.

 

Twenty days doesn’t seem like a long time to make a lasting impact, but enduring changes can and do happen. “We come and see what the need is, and using collective experience and strategies we professional development for the teachers. One teacher said to Lusungu who is a teacher, reading interventionist and coach, "I don't need help with creative writing this year because I’m still applying the techniques you taught me last year." That kind of feedback is important to keep in mind when doing short missions trips. We do have the power to catalyze lasting improvements.

As time goes on we hope to have individual blogs from all of the volunteers. Due to limited wifi and time, we’ll see how that goes and keep you posted. We just wanted to let you know that A to Zed is off to a strong beginning on the ground in Zambia.

#TeamAtoZed's work on the ground in Zambia is off to a great start!

Much love from your international and stateside volunteers and we thank you for following our journey! Subscribe to our blog and follow us on Facebook for more photos and updates.

Peace, Love, and Education,

Helese Smauldon

Stateside Volunteer
Media and Communications