Project WET changes habits in Northern Uganda
Long synonymous with brutal wars and displaced persons, Northern Uganda today is the site of an ambitious pilot program to improve water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) education and decrease water-borne diseases. Now, a year after launch, the initial results are in—and the impacts are dramatic.
The Project WET Foundation, in cooperation with the Uganda Education Ministry and USAID, in July 2009 held a series of “train-the-trainers” seminars to teach educators how to implement the Project WET Healthy Water, Healthy Habits, Healthy People Educators Guide. Emphasizing concrete behaviors that decrease the spread of diseases that can be prevented by clean water and training in proper hygiene, the materials ultimately reached more than 500 teachers, who in turn brought the lessons to some 40,000 students.
In April 2010, Uganda Project WET Coordinator Teddy Tindamanyire began a series of follow-up visits to 40 of the schools where teachers had received and been trained to use the Project WET WASH materials. Ninety percent were still using the materials, and schools implementing the WASH materials told Tindamanyire that the lessons had resulted in fewer absences, exponential growth in handwashing and greater community involvement.
At Dokolo Primary School, four handwashing stations were installed after Project WET materials were introduced. Ojok Sam, the teacher who runs the school’s health office, told Tindamanyire that the number of ill students visiting him has dropped dramatically.
“I (used to) get about 15 students complaining of stomachaches and about five complaining of fever or headache,” Sam explained, noting that the figure now is “less than five students.” He credits strict adherence to the handwashing program introduced by Project WET’s fun, interactive lessons.
Sam added that pupils at the school have taken on responsibility for continuing the program, including setting up a display that they call the “WET corner,” where student projects reinforce the healthy habits learned in the classroom. And while Project WET specially tailors all of its materials for the region in which they are distributed, students in Dokolo have gone further, creating their own book of poems about water and healthy habits. They also continue to sing the “Handwashing Song” each day to remind them to wash at home—and carry the message back to their families.
In the village of Padibe, students inspired by Project WET lessons built more than 10 “Tippy Taps”—simple and economical hand washing stations—to encourage better hygiene and fight disease.
Overall, the visits revealed that all of the schools still using the materials had improvements in their student’s behavior regarding water sanitation and hygiene practices. They have seen increased handwashing—up to 800 percent greater, in the case of a school in Entebbe—and greater understanding of when washing is necessary. Students reported that their parents no longer allowed them to drink water that had not been boiled, and school administrators said that students themselves demanded soap at handwashing stations.
Ugandan educators’ enthusiasm over the program’s potential was boundless. As one teacher said optimistically, “If schools include (Project WET) materials, over time we shall not have any water-related diseases.”
For Northern Uganda, that goal—while still far away—is a little closer now than it was just a year ago, thanks to the educators who have taught the Project WET WASH lessons to their students and, by extension, the communities in which they work and live.
Contributed by Project WET