Contact Address: Future
In Our Hands
FIOH
Kotu South, Ksmd
Banjul area Head office
PO Box 352 Serrekunda
Kanifing Municipality
The Gambia, West Africa
Tel no: +220 4460360 / 4460363
Email: office@fioh.org
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Information:
The Future In Our Hands (FIOH) was established in Gambia
in the early 1980s and is a member of the umbrella organisation
in the Greater Banjul area called TANGO. It is a Swedish
based charity and registered NGO which is focused on
promoting education and increasing the capacity of people
in rural communities to combat grinding poverty.
Areas of Intervention: • Community
Development Programme:-
The aim of the scheme is to alleviate
poverty by enhancing the capacity of community institutions
with special emphasis on human rights based advocacy
and livelihood
skills training to allow poor and marginalised people
to raise their standards of living and economic independence.
FIOH Gambia works in tandem with village development
projects to identify the priority areas of any programme
before its execution. A plan is then set out in the
form of a Community Action Plan. A number of fairly
wide issues are tackled such as examples in the following:
- Agriculture and food security (cereal stores, vegetable
gardening).
- Entrepreneurship skills training & civic education.
- Environment ( tree planting schemes, waste management,
sewage).
- Gender
and equality (early marriages, FGM).
- Good governance & organisational development.
- Health (Malaria prevention & control, HIV/Aids,
hygiene, nutrition).
- Women & youth capacity building & empowerment.
The various Community Based Organisations (CBOs), which
they work with to achieve these goals are environmental
clubs, gender equality committees, mothers' clubs, parent
teacher associations (PTA), Alkalos and other community
leaders, Village Development Committees (VDCs) among
others. • Schools Construction
Through their Construction and Technical Training Unit
FIOH carries out schools building construction
locally initiated as part of its program or through
building contracts received from the Ministry of Basic
and Secondary Education via their Project Coordination
Unit. The department's international donors includes
the World Bank, EFA Fast Track Initiative, UNICEF and
others.
As at 2012 it has assisted with building or refurbishing
about 160 school kitchens, 1,000 classrooms, 900 toilets,
230 staff rooms and built 95 Lower Basic Schools.
• Teaching Methods
Their education development plan works on teacher training
in order to improve the standard of education in schools.
To this end an early learning reading system has been
adapted for The Gambia. The program is the Serholt Early
Grade Reading Ability (SEGRA) which began in 2009. It
adopts active learning which involves groups of six
to eight pupils learning letters and blending the sounds
of letters into words through fun, games and play using
writing strips, books, rhymes, picture and alphabet
sound cards etc.
Funding & Affiliations:
Future In Our Hands is the implementing branch of Gambiagrupperna
and its work is supported by funding from the Swedish
International Development Co-operation Agency in Valhallavägen
in Stockholm.
Directions:
Their signboard is opposite Kololi Tavern on the Kololi
Road. |