Azza Kamel meeting

This was one of a series of meetings to discuss Deca as part of outreach

Azza Kamel is director of NGO Alwan w Awtar

It is proposed that we work with them in a Deca-NGO partnership as part of outreach

Feb 2nd 2012

• A&A been working for 5 years
• lots of activities – art, drama, story-telling etc – and non-formal education (as lots of children's families cannot afford the private classes necessary to do well at school
• breaking cycle of poverty
• said socially mixed setting as we will have could be feasible, but does not have experience of it – main beneficiaries of A&A are under-privileged
• public transportation in the area is not easy
• art is a taboo in the area A&A is working in Zilzal etc
• parents are very concerned with education – and also better behaviour
• did not reach out to others. Rather through the work get them to see. So rather than approaching schools, the schools came to them having seen the result of their work with their students
• did not need to reach out at the start to get children to join because was already working (volunteering at Fathat Kheir, and knew the mothers, suggested to them to send their kids
• sometimes schools take credit for their work - eg when students perform something to inspector visiting school and these students learnt their performance at A&A
• One of the weaknesses – according to Azza – is not addressing the community as a whole – working on this now
• absolutely essential to get community leaders on board
• consistency, trust – is essential and long-term
• there is always someone willing to break the social trend – and they become leadership
• charge 5LE
• people are very suspicious of foreigners – including non-egyptian arabs
• fifteen staff – full and part time – plus some are session based
• paid staff - volunteers are not sustainable
• Do admin work in the mornings when not many children around
• every year school is different – different holidays, shifts etc
• when children showed a film they had made to parents - parents were v upset because it showed garbage

• transportation - 14 to 15 years boys can independently take the microbus
• boys and girls in the same space - conservatism
• people in Moqattam are suspicious of new places and people not from the area

Contacts/Networks to build in the Moqattam Area

• Layla Nasr - organized the cleaning of the streets in Tahrir
• Nesrine Gomaa - editor
• Mona Orashi - Community Center including a women's space for sewing/cooking - Fathat Kheir