The name Amandla comes from the Xhosa/Zulu tradition of call-and-response. A crowd member declares "Amandla!" meaning 'power' and the crowd responds "Ngawethu!" adding that the power 'is ours.'

Amandla Development builds its partners' capacity in order to help them effectively deliver on their respective missions and to be responsive to the data they share with each other about the young people they work with. By cultivating powerful networks that work, partner innovations can reach beyond their local communities to have national impact.

Well-managed institutions that are data-driven are fundamental to promoting locally driven change. Amandla Development equips effective NGOs that work with young people through tailored services designed to improve:

• Documentation and assessment
• Thought partnership with school principals and teachers
• Networking capacity
• Talent management and development
• Fundraising strategy and execution

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NGOs, Education, and opportunity in South Africa

Education and Development in South Africa

 

Actors focus on their own service delivery while incorporating key knowledge from partners to fill their structural holes and have the multiple impacts necessary for schools to teach effectively and young people to overcome obstacles to their learning. To facilitate collective impact Amandla Development:

• Encourages a Connected Ecosystem
• Facilitates articulation of common vision and goals
• Coordinates communication between organisations and stakeholders
• Collects and distributes knowledge on what works so that work is strategic and data-driven

NGOs fill gaps and innovate in important ways that policymakers usually cannot. They meet needs and do important work that must expand and achieve sustainability. Examples include:

• Centre for Education Policy Development (CEPD) helped craft current education policy during the dying days of apartheid and continues to contribute key research to education policy in South Africa
• LEAP School serves disadvantaged youth and has a 100% pass rate for the national matriculation exam versus the national average of approximately 50%. 75% of LEAP graduates since 2005 have continued to higher education compared to 12-15% nationally
• The Observatory Junior School's Shine Centre has seen an increase in the literacy rate from 48% to 78% in grade 6 learners since 2002. Overcrowded classrooms struggle to identify and help learners struggling with literacy, but Shine Centre's efforts give learners the individual attention they need.
• The Shine Centre Cape Town, South Africa: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTuyL8ULyuc

These are just a few examples of NGOs that have seen success in advancing education among South African youth, but it does not stop there. The continued growth and flourishing of such efforts is imperative for the expansion of opportunity for those left behind in South Africa. This is where Amandla Development steps in.

With Amandla Development's help, partners can change the face of education and opportunity for the youth of South Africa. We help social entrepreneurs follow their dreams: to change the future for the youth of their country.

Kliptown Youth Program

 

KYP is a youth development programme that provides the youth of Kliptown with tutoring, athletic and arts programmes.

Over the next several months, Amandla Development and KYP are working together on KYP's strategic planning initiative. As KYP grows from strength to strength, they are intentional about charting a course that allows them to deepen the impact they have on the lives of Kliptown’s youth while also being able to reach out to more young people. With Amandla Development’s help, KYP is thinking through its role in the Kliptown community and how to grow its organisation to meet the community’s needs.

Film

 

Amandla Development and filmmaker Wim Steytler are collaborating to illustrate the need for a collective impact approach for improving access to quality education. Principals, NGOs, teachers and young people share their stories of their daily challenges seeking an empowering education. The film shows the complexity that young people face every day as they seek an education that will open up opportunities for them. Coming from poor homes in poor communities to poorly resourced schools, young people are challenged from every side. Fixing education is about more than just fixing schools. It is about meeting the needs of young people in the 80% of the day they spend outside school.