Our Story

More than six years since the ceasefire brokered between the government of Uganda and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), the focus of peace-building activity in the former conflict region of Northern Uganda has been on   concentrated efforts to rebuild communities, renew livelihood activities and tackle the root causes of conflict. Low-intensity disputes (e.g. land, domestic, community stigma) still remain potent at the community level creating a need to build local capacity to resolve conflict. These findings support the need to further support peace-building and reconciliation at the community level, where tensions are most felt, in order to address low-level disputes before they escalate.

For these reasons, this program capitalizes on the inherent opportunities in sport to empower school-based sport teachers, community coaches, and youth in the Gulu and Kitgum districts of Northern Uganda to strategically respond to conflict in sport and transfer these strategies to other conflicts of low-intensity to build more inclusive post-conflict communities.  The program team along with the district education and sports offices will identify program participants to maximize program effectiveness. Multiple training sessions will take place over a one-month period within the two designated districts at the project start date in July 2013.  Program assistants under the direction of the program director (me) will collect bi-weekly data from each program participant for a period of 9 months beginning September 2013 - just after the last initial training session. We seek to involve nearly 100 school-based sport teachers, community-based coaches, and select youth over the course of the year. 

This program is based on several years of research by the program director in the former conflict region.  A pilot program was launched successfully in 2012 that yielded specific outcomes to support a larger scale program. Together with a well-skilled team of local assistants, we have developed this educational program as a sustainable model of peace-building and conflict resolution.  A team of trained, local program assistants montior the progress of each program participant and collect monthly data to more clearly understand the program impact. The coach and sport teacher participants from the pilot program will be assigned future program participants as an additional system of support.  They will also begin to take an active role in the educational training workshops in order to take on the facilator role.

What We Need & What You Get

To begin this program, we need to raise the projected amount by July 1, 2013. All funds contributed to this program go to the following direct in-country expenses for the daily operation:

Human resources: Approximately 1/3 of the funds will go towards renumeration of the Ugandan-based program team for start up costs, transportation and communications facilitation, and monthly monitoring and evaluation expenses.  Also, coaches from the pilot program team will receive faciliation renumeration for their program support visits to each program site.

Program equipment:  Approximately 1/3 of the funds will go to support the purchase of sport equipment for each participating school and community-based program as per the following – one soccer ball, and one netball or volleyball, and carrying bag to benefit their respective sport programs for participation in the duration of the project in lieu of direct payment.

Program Supplies:  Approximately 1/3 of the funds will go towards supply resources that include training session-related resources are described as the resources necessary to implement the training sessions.  These resources include printing costs (manuals and other documents), writing supplies, meals, and venue costs (if applicable).  The training sessions will take place in multiple sites within in each of the two targeted districts to accommodate participants to avoid the issuances of travel per diems. In addition, each program team member and participant will receive a PP t-shirt to note their status as a program participant.  Participants will also receive certficates of completion after the conclusion of their program training.

Please note:  The program director was awarded a small grant to cover all travel expenses in order for campaign funds to go directly to the program expenses.

All those donating to this program will receive a number of perks as a sincere thanks for their support. Check out those perks!

The Impact

This program will provide both long- and short-term impact at the local and regional level by building the capacity of community members (adults and youth) to strategically respond to low-intensity conflict to build more inclusive communities.  In short, we want to educate and support our participants so they become the program directors in the future!

Program assistants also gain valuable data collection and programming knowledge that will support them in future employment and educational endeavors.  Our goal is to educate and provide an impact to everyone involved in the program!

This project will also serve as a springboard to future programming for behavioral interventions utilizing sport as the primary medium to address conflict-related behaviors in young survivors of war elsewhere in the world. 

Other Ways You Can Help

That is okay if you cannot contribute to this program.  We do ask that you share this campaign with friends, family, and businesses as you see fit.  In short, a little noise might just go a long way!

Check out a brief article on the program director's fieldwork in this publication: http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/heifer/worldark_2010fall/#/12