Home » ExchangeEveryDay » AIDS and Young Children in Western Kenya.



ExchangeEveryDay Past Issues


<< Previous Issue | View Past Issues | | Next Issue >> ExchangeEveryDay
AIDS and Young Children in Western Kenya.
March 9, 2007
When the well is dry, we know the worth of water.
-Benjamin Franklin
In Western Kenya, the HIV & AIDS scourge has debilitated ommunities’ care giving systems for masses of young children, leaving them under the care of ill equipped caregivers. Their efforts towards care for OVC need to be strengthened. KORDP uses a community based care (CBC) approach, the Early Childhood Day Care Center(ECDCC) model based on community volunteerism to do this. The challenge is how to successfully initiate and maintain community volunteerism.

KORDP, www.kordp.org facilitates 47 ECDCC Institutional Volunteer Committees to support 5,200 OVCs at village sites where children receive medical care, meals, play, emotional support and basic learning skills for transition to formal school. To strengthen the care giving systems for needy families and the ECDCC institutions, food security and income generation initiatives are implemented on family and institutional levels.

The ECDCC model has shown that a preparation period of at least one year is probably one of the most essential elements for the success of this community based care model. This period is needed to

  • motivate the community to switch from apathy to actively seeking solutions;
  • to mobilize communities into legally registered care providing committees; and
  • to build their skills in health, sanitation, food, shelter, HIV & AIDS prevention & advocacy, psycho-social support, education, income generation and monitoring & evaluation.
This period creates tremendous community commitment; ownership and volunteerism, recreating home at the ECDCC and bringing life into the OVC families.

CBC approaches for OVC are likely to succeed if during the Project planning period communities are sensitized towards volunteerism as the basic ingredient in the foundation for ownership and sustainability of the development efforts in caring for young children within the context of HIV&AIDS.

KORDP will be one of the participants in the Action Tank on “HIV/AIDS and the Young Child: Promising Practices for the ECD community” during the 2007 World Forum in Kuala Lumpur. To let us know of other programs with promising practices that might be suitable for inclusion in the action tank, please contact [email protected]

Contributed by Kathleen Okatcha

ExchangeEveryDay

Delivered five days a week containing news, success stories, solutions, trend reports, and much more.

What is ExchangeEveryDay?

ExchangeEveryDay is the official electronic newsletter for Exchange Press. It is delivered five days a week containing news stories, success stories, solutions, trend reports, and much more.

Toddler Portable Sink: Your Classroom Solution for HOT and COLD running water. A convenient, time-saving way to clean children's messy hands anytime, anywhere.


Comments (1)

Displaying 1 Comment
Joyce Webster · March 09, 2007
Houston, TX, United States


What is this OVC? Please clarify abbreviations and acronmym.



Post a Comment

Have an account? to submit your comment.


required

Your e-mail address will not be visible to other website visitors.
required
required
required

Check the box below, to help verify that you are not a bot. Doing so helps prevent automated programs from abusing this form.



Disclaimer: Exchange reserves the right to remove any comments at its discretion or reprint posted comments in other Exchange materials.