Zimbabwe, Sub-Saharan Africa  Show on interactive map

IDRC

Huib Huyse, Jan Van Ongevalle, Steff Deprez

St2eep is a partnership between the Zimbabwe Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education and VVOB and aims to integrate EE across the curriculum of secondary teacher training in Zimbabwe. The first phase of the project (2003-2005) was characterised by a strong operational involvement of the donor representatives and was recognised as an unsustainable situation. The result oriented logical framework which was guiding the first phase of the project did not provide us with a tool or a guide to plan for future project sustainability. We therefore decided to use the outcome mapping perspective to plan for the second phase of the project. Outcome mapping helped us to clearly define St2eep as the implementing organization and to identify the boundary partners St2eep is able to influence. OM also helped us to pull the donor out of St2eep and get a clearer picture of the reality in which the project has to operate without the operational involvement of the donor. This resulted in separate complementary visions, missions, progress markers, strategy maps and monitoring and evaluation systems related to St2eep and related to VVOB. This was a big step forward from the original logical framework set-up where there was no clear distinction between St2eep, the donor (VVOB) and the boundary partners, with most of the operational work done by the donor and where success was measured through visible results. Through outcome mapping we managed to map a way forward whereby St2eep is much more in the hands of the local partners while VVOB’s role is more focused on capacity development. 2006 will be a transition year for St2eep and VVOB, during which we are starting to implement the planning based on the outcome mapping. Sharing experiences with members of this community will definitely help us forward.The project team is especially interested to learn more on how ideas of the logical framework approach can complement and enhance the outcome mapping methodology so that it becomes more practical in the field.