Dar Network Operations Report May 2007
Download dar_network_operations_report_may_07.doc
This is a report from Tim on how the network has been operating in the month of May 2007.
Officer Activities
For the past four months, we’ve sent you a detailed account of what jobs each officer has done. In order to save time, this month we are summarizing the information in two tables – one showing the hours put in by each officer, and the other showing the number of tasks that each officer did. We are asking Donatian to put these two tables up on the wall so that anyone who wants can take a look. We will also publish them on the web site.
Exchange visits
We have information about exchange visits up to the end of April, so the information below does not include what happened since the last meeting.
April was a good month for exchange visits – members carried out 22 visits, compared with only 9 in March. We hope that you are still finding them useful and interesting. The full information on who has done which visits is in a table which will be displayed on the walls of the meeting room. If the information is not correct, please tell Pascal
Some groups have not received many visitors recently. Please could members at the meeting write down the names of the groups that need to be visited,and try to arrange to visit at least one of them during the month of June. The groups that have had few visits (including the number of visits in 2007 between January and April) are Vumwe 1; Wolisu 3; Pofideso, MSWS 4; NICE, CISO, SOCAC 5; Woyona, Uzima, Tupendano, Tawosu 6.
Some groups have not made many visits so far in 2007. Please could members at the meeting write down the names of the groups, and invite them to come and visit you. So far this year, Uzima, Tupendane, and NICE have not made visits; Chiyowonet, Moms, Red House, Sageta, Sinza, Tukolene, and Twafaha have made one each.
Please remember that you are paid your public-transport travel expenses for visiting, PLUS an allowance of 7,000 shillings for one person or 14,000 for two or more once you give in an exchange report at the next meeting.
Accounts
We try to keep accurate accounts for the network for two reasons. One reason is that if we can show we know how to look after the money, then donors will be more likely to give money. The other reason is that clear and public accounts help to protect you, the members, from the money being stolen.
The accounts up to the end of April have been prepared by Yovita and we have published them on the web site. Anyone who wants to is welcome to see them and read them in detail, including all the expenses of the officers.
But there is one important thing missing. We in London have no idea whether the accounts information we have been given is actually correct, because we don’t know how much money there is in the network bank account. The officers have been asked to make sure that we are sent bank statements each month, and as soon as we send them we will publish the bank statements on the web site and send the information to all members.
We have tried to arrange for the statements to be sent directly by the bank. But the bank has not sent them, and the officers have not sent them either. So unfortunately we can’t give you any reassurance about what is in your bank account.
Award for best learning from exchange visit
The clocks finally arrived at CARE just after last month’s meeting. We reported last month that Chimaba Sanaa is the winner of this prize, and we hope that the chairman of the meeting will award a clock to Chimaba as their prize.
Award for best report or planning document
Two members have very kindly offered to help other groups to prepare reports. Shabani Madega offered to help Woyona, and Charles Kamugisha offered to help SOCAC. Because we have not yet received any reports from these two groups, we have not yet been able to decide a winner. Could members please vote and tell us whether you would like to give these groups more time, or go ahead and judge the plans that have been submitted by next month.
Other funding sources
So far we have not heard back from the network about raising money from other funders. We are happy to help with this, but you, the members, need to decide what the money would be used for and appoint someone to put together a draft funding application. We suggest that an application for between 10 million and 20 million shillings might be a plausible amount.
Email use
Members are really starting to use email to communicate with each other! This is wonderful news. So far, we have 452 message in the group email list. If you are not using email yet, please talk to Donatian – and please remember that the network will pay the cost of an hour’s Internet access once a week for you if you send a message to the network. Donatian has been doing training and if you need more help in learning how to use the Internet then please talk to him. Remember that the Internet can be extremely helpful for you in helping you to raise money for your group from donors in other countries.
Meeting attendance
Please remember that each month your should arrange a backup person so that if the normal member who represents you is suddenly unable to come, you will still be able to send someone. If there is a problem with your backup, you should contact Pascal so that he can offer your place to somebody else.
This report
We don’t know whether this reporting is useful to members. Could members please hold a discussion about what kind of monthly report you would like from us and then ask Donatian to send us your conclusions by email.
We hope you enjoy the May network meeting and find it useful.
Best wishes to all of you for the month of June, and to the children that you are caring for!
