Day 7

Fieldwork Day One:

I am basing some of my dissertation around asset mapping and community based participatory research so understanding and fully involving myself in the fieldwork is extremely important. I discussed with Peter the evening before about what my role would be when we were out in the field and we decided that what would be most beneficial to myself and the project would be if I was in charge or recording everything.

We woke up at the usual time and had breakfast, I decided to go all out and have three Weetabix today, I thought I might need the extra fuel and my banana and hot chocolate (as always). We then met in the classroom to confirm that we all knew what our roles were, collect our equipment and have a briefing.

My role was to take pictures of what each of the individual groups were doing to highlight the CBPR part of the CM4K project. Whilst doing this I needed to know what it was that was going on in each of the pictures. I found that this helped me to help to groups to as because I was between the groups I could let them know what the other groups had done which meant everyone knew what everyone was up to. It also helped me to identify what could be done differently and what worked well. Split into three groups Audio, Video and Photography:

Audio – Charlotte, Wendy, Fiona, Oliver, Halima, Lydia
Video – (group one) Eve, May, Sam, Aaron, Mercie (group two) Kassim, Angel
Photography – Japheth, Hafsah, Luca, Geoffrey

I was documenting the group working. Recording the asset mapping and CBPR with Andres. Part of this included recording each locations Longitude and Latitude.

Cham gi Wadu divisional office and future office building:

Long – 34, 36, 21
Lat – 0, -53, -41

This was our starting point. It was very busy as many community members came out to see what we were doing. The chief was there to be interviewed and we had a welcome speech. We were informed that this would happen at all the places we went to.

Kakwara Primary school:

Long –
Lat –

This school was different from the others because it had a special needs department which was lovely to see. I did enjoy going there but I felt like we spent too long there and would have used our time better at the secondary school we went to next.

School Entrance:

Long – 34, 35, 49
Lat – 0, -51, -29

O’Mara Secondary School:

Long – 34, 35, 50
Lat – 0, -51, -23

This was my favourite part of the day. Although I was very tired by this point. The entire school came to join us for a welcome meeting. They were so pleased to see us and eager to learn. Students learnt how to use the equipment, one very talented girl Siprase Aluoch (17) was very good at learning how to use the camera and teach others. I chatted with the headmaster about the project and my involvement which he seems genuinely interested in. We also talked about organising a trip between Rongo university and O’Mara school to teach them more about Media Studies and Community Media.

O’Mara Primary School:

Long – 34, 35, 47
Lat – 0, -51, -23

I think we may has unintentionally visited this school but it was great all the same. We kept it short and sweet, collecting the pictures and video very quickly.

We returned to the university and uploaded all of the footage, images and audio from the SD cards onto our computers. I started editing and deleting my pictures but was so tired I have decided to finish them tomorrow. Wishful thinking probably if tomorrows anything like today.

After dinner we went back to the Pastoral centre and reflected on the day. We sat for an hour discussing the day when we were joined by Peter. We chose this opportunity to give him the feedback we have discussed which turned into another hour of critical reflection. We agreed that we had worked hard but there were many things that didn’t go to plan that we needed to improve on.

Critical Reflections:

Timekeeping – we were meant to go back to the university at 2pm this turned into 5:45pm. Everything took a lot longer than what was intended.
Knowing what we are doing – delegation and defining roles within each group means that things are being done efficiently rather than people doing there own thing and getting repetition of work or doing things that are great but aren’t relevant to asset mapping.
Community – I don’t know if they understand they need to be active in making this project work. It takes time. I have the feeling that they want to see results now without understanding the work that goes into it. I do worry for the longevity of this project without the likes of Peter, Jerry and Isobel to guide it. As it stands from what I have seen so far without both universities participation continuing for at least another 5 years the community would not understand how to keep the station running. Saying that they are all very passionate about the station and keen to have one. I just don’t know if that’s enough.
Teaching – Understanding how to operate the equipment is so important. If you can’t understand how to work the equipment to a high standard how can you be expected to teach others.
Partnership between UOB and UOR – it seems we have conflicting ideas of what needs to be prioritised in the fieldwork with UOR focusing more on CBPR and UOB doing the work required for asset mapping. This will need to be spoken about tomorrow if we are to achieve complete understanding and unity between the two Universities.

In conclusion today was a great learning curb. Extremely exciting and challenging. Hopefully the next few days will go more smoothly, I’m sure it will once people have a clearer idea of what is expected of them and the best way to go about it. Its all very positive.