Update on the Polytechnic

Dec 11^th, 2008 – The progress is slow at best. We are making progress but not enough to keep 6 of us anywhere near busy. We are branching out to other things, like the afternoon kid’s camp, mending clothes and trying to find more to do. Some of it will just have to be our own initiative, asking and finding more to do. We do have several kids that hand around a lot of the day, so we are making local contact and learning a little about life hear in Mbita Kenya. But back to the Polytechnic.

Last weeks meeting really concentrated on the job description for the Polytechnic Manager and Instructors. Thanks to one former instructor at the school who was here when it closed, we got a few good ideas and suggestions. The main one being to make it a combo Manager / Instructor position, at least to start. We took the task of creating the flyer to be used upon ourselves, mainly to make sure it got done in time. They are moving aggressively on this item. Posted the notice last Friday, giving just a week for the manager candidates to apply, they will review on Saturday to select ones to interview and have them show up next Monday for interviews and sounds like make them start working on Tuesday. Wow, that seems real quick, but they, the committee members figured me get many applications in that time. One day to go and we have 2 applications, one of which we already had contact with, so that doesn’t really count as a whole one.

The one that we had contact with appears to be a viable candidate, with some good experience and knowledge. He was a former teacher here (the same one noted above) so we should be able to get some references checked out, or as they call them here ‘referees’. Hopefully by early next week we’ll have a manager on staff and be moving a little faster.

The instructor’s applications are due by Friday the 19^th. This was also in the posting, but we have not seen any candidates yet. Maybe they all wait until the last minute to turn them in.

With the upcoming hiring of the manager funding becomes a bigger concern. There is about 22,000 shillings available from when the Polytechnic closed and this is available to the committee to use. To put this into perspective, the manager’s salary should be 8,000 to 10,000 a month. And 22,000 shillings is less than $300 US dollars.

So where will funds come from? A few sources hopefully, but not the one most are hoping for. The hoped for one that isn’t going to happen to any major extent is the Paul Maier family as they refer to us collectively. Even through we have said many times to many people that ‘we are here to assist you, to use our heads, heart and hands, not to supply the financing.” Of course I’m sure they ignore the parts they don’t want to hear and with the impression that all Mzungus are rich (which we are relatively speaking) and they assume we will be supply some funds. And we are planning on supplying some, but not much. Our current plan is to help pay for some of the Manager’s salary for the first couple of months. Put we will only match some of the funds they have, give it sporadically over the period. We don’t want them to think we are going to be an ongoing funding source or that they can count on us to bail them out. When we do give the money, we will probably not even say it all comes from us, but that it can from various sources as one time donations.

We never had the intention, nor did we budget, to fund any major project here. For this project in particular, I think that they more they pay for the better long term chances it has to survive. I don’t want the Polytechnic’s survival to be dependent on continuous funding from sporadic US sources and particularly the Paul Maier family. We will see how that goes.

There are many NGOs (non-governmental organizations) that are already in existence that will probably help some. Some that the Polytechnic has had relationships with in the past and hopefully some new ones going forward. Also the Kenya government does supply some support through various means, but being new here we do not know what those are or how to go about getting any funds from them. Also, it will be interesting to see if the Homa Bay diocese will be putting up any money since this is part of their local Mbita parish. They did not say they were in our initial meetings with them when they thought this would be a good project for us. In fact I felt like they avoided the issue other than allude to the Maier Family potential.

One of the first main tasks of the new manager will be fund raising by recruiting paying students, contacting and working with NGOs, and Kenya governmental agencies. Some of these, particularly the NGOs, will probably be sponsorship of students.

The initial expenses will be some salaries for the manager and instructors. New tools will also be needed. Also there may be some building maintenance, but most (locals) seem to think they are in good shape as is. We also have some major electric machines – planers, drill presses, welder, etc, that need maintenance on them as they have been out of service at least 18 months, is not several years.

One additional step we, the Maier Family, is taking responsibility for is the re-painting of Polytechnic sign on the street. The name is changing and so are the courses, so it needs to be redone. It also seems to be the main advertising resource. So we are hoping to create a little buzz by changing the sign so people will see we are moving forward.

I think that brings you up to date. Sorry if the writing and the flow is a little disjointed, but I just didn’t fell like doing several drafts or sitting down before hand to organize my thoughts.

Signing off from Mbita,

Paul