Umoja: Facilitator’s Guide
umoja
Transforming Communities
Facilitator’s Guide
Produced by:
Francis Njoroge, Tulo Raistrick
Bill Crooks and Jackie Mouradian
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Umoja: Facilitator’s Guide
Contents
‘If you think you’re too small to
make a difference, you’ve never
been in bed with a mosquito’
Anita Roddick
Introduction
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Overview and Purpose of Umoja
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Stage 1: Envisioning and equipping the church
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Part 1: Envisioning the church
Part 2: Using our resources
Part 3: Local church initiative
Part 4: Learning and reflection
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46
53
Stage 2: Envisioning the community
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Part 1: How should we work with our community
Part 2: Describing the community
Part 3: Gathering information
Part 4: Analysis of information
Part 5: Learning and reflection
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80
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107
Stage 3: Dreaming dreams and planning for action
109
Part 1: Dreaming dreams
Part 2: Clarifying what to do next
Part 3: Planning for action and organising ourselves
Part 4: Learning and reflection
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Stage 4: Taking Action
133
1. Bible study
2. Clarifying the purpose of the project and the priority tasks
3. How to monitor your project
4. How should we delegate?
5. Managing and valuing people
6. How to keep ourselves motivated
7. Building a team
8. How to have an effective meeting
9. How to keep others informed
10. Keeping project records
11. Taking specialist advice
12. Learning and reflection
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Stage 5: Evaluation
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The Purpose of evaluation
Questions and tools for doing an evaluation
What is next?
Final thoughts
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Appendices:
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A. The constitution of a community organisation
B. Good Governance
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172
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Umoja: Facilitator’s Guide
Introduction
Welcome to Umoja! The word Umoja means “togetherness” in the Swahili language of
East Africa. Umoja helps church leaders and their congregations work together with the
community to bring about positive changes for the whole community. It is a process
that brings hope, self-esteem and transformation to churches and communities, and is
based on over twenty years of experience of working throughout Africa and Asia.
Umoja is about bringing energy and excitement to churches and communities
concerning the positive changes they can make for themselves. It seeks to build on the
resources they have and encourages the discovery of new skills and expertise within a
community. Far too often, development projects are dependent on injections of outside
aid and often leave individuals and communities worse off. Umoja seeks to do the
opposite: inspiring and equipping local people with a vision for determining their own
future with their own resources.
This book – the Umoja Facilitator’s Guide – provides everything you need to know to
help a church and community become inspired and start working for transformation in
the community. It does not assume previous knowledge of Umoja, but you may find
it very helpful to attend training on Umoja prior to using these materials, where this is
available.
The Umoja Facilitator’s Guide covers the following areas:
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An overview of Umoja – its purpose, benefits, the role of the facilitator
Envisioning the church – Bible studies and activities to help churches gain a
vision for community involvement
Envisioning the community – activities and ideas to help communities assess
their needs and resources, with accompanying Bible studies where appropriate
Dreaming dreams and planning for action – activities and ideas to help
communities develop a vision for the future and plan for it, with accompanying
Bible studies where appropriate
Taking action – activities and advice to help communities ensure that the plans
are carried out and positive change happens
Evaluation - a review of how the church and the community have worked together
to plan and run projects to improve the lives of individuals and the community.
It is possible to refer to any of these stages and not necessarily follow them in a
set order. The key thing is that you select the material in the book that is most
appropriate to your situation.
An accompanying book – the Umoja Co-ordinator’s Guide – provides everything that
an organisation or church denomination needs to know to start and manage an Umoja
programme across a number of local communities.
We hope you enjoy the journey.
Francis, Tulo, Bill and Jackie
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