About Us

We are a community based organization

Sabatia initiative for sustainable development (SAIDE) is a non-profit making, non-governmental Community Based Organization (CBO) located in Vihiga County of western Kenya. It was brought into existence in the year 2009 as a self-help group whose sole ambition was to address the core issues affecting the nascent society.

Our Mission

To directly impact our immediate community with access to education, to empower and promote participation of vulnerable and disadvantaged members of the society in socio-economic activities through capacity building, training, research and establishment of IGAs for sustainable development.

Our Vision

Transforming the livelihood of the vulnerable and disadvantaged towards self–reliance and sustainability.

Our Objectives

  • To improve quality of life of the disadvantaged and vulnerable members of the community especially those affected and infected by HIV/AIDS
  • Advocacy of the children rights and pursuit of defaulters
  • To conduct community awareness campaign against malnutrition.
  • To empower the vulnerable and disadvantaged members of the society through capacity building, training and skills upgrading
  • To promote the establishment and to strengthen the existing IGAs for purposes of sustainability and livelihood improvement
  • To promote natural resource management and biodiversity

ABOUT SAIDE

Sabatia initiative for sustainable development (SAIDE) is a non-profit making, non-governmental Community Based Organization (CBO) located in Vihiga County of western Kenya. It was brought into existence in the year 2009 as a self-help group whose sole ambition was to address the core issues affecting the nascent society. At inception, the main focus was to impact education standards in the region by formulating policies and programs that ensured an exciting learning environment for better school performance. With the perennial low performance by schools in the region, education presented an immediate need that required redress urgently. This was in a bid to increase the number of pupils who proceeded from primary school to high school and those from high school joining tertiary institutions. Along the journey, however, there was a need to incorporate other emerging issues. This was prompted by the realization that they were directly intertwined with education and woven into the society- education could no longer be treated in isolation. SAIDE hence diversified its key mandate to incorporate health, agriculture/food security, democracy, social empowerment and advocacy and entrepreneurship. SAIDE believes in the need to create a self-sufficient, sustainable society. We believe in the power of an informed and knowledgeable society to solve some of the perennial problems bedeviling the society. SAIDE has therefore positioned herself first as a knowledge hub for the society.

SAIDE'S JOURNEY

At inception in the year 2009, SAIDE set out to impact on the education standards in Vihiga County. The founder members expressed a deep belief in the power of education to transform lives and empower the locals to make sound decisions in other aspects of their lives like agriculture, e.t.c. It was further realized that education standards had been on the decline over the years and there was urgent need to reduce the number of young adults dropping out of school. Some of the core reasons attributed to this were lack of adequate learning materials like textbooks, inadequate guiding and counseling which led to the students not knowing exactly what they want to achieve when they grow up, and general poverty which caused the young intellectuals to do without a meal and other basic requirements like sanitary towels. The young school drop outs could end up languishing in drug abuse and prostitution which ruined their lives. This, in the long run, contributed to the vicious cycle of poverty in the region. In this regard, SAIDE set out to open a community library to enable the children access books and other reading material easily. The founder members donated books, magazines, reference texts, newspapers and journals and set up the library. With time, more people saw the potential and donated books and soon the first community library was put up. To reach the primary target audience, SAIDE launched a mobile library service which further enhanced the number of learners reached and hence the impact. The outreach program dubbed One Hour Reading Culture involves taking learning materials to children in schools-most of which lack proper library establishments, places of worship and to the general public in other social gatherings. To date, we have 8 schools are enlisted to the program which reaches to an estimated 600 pupils weekly. The aim of this program is develop attitude change and motivate students through reading in order to nature a reading culture in them. SAIDE further launched a basic computer literacy training for the community around most of whom lacked the most essential computer know-how. SAIDE was convicted that knowledge about computers and the internet would expose the members of the community to a vast source of information if well leveraged could have enormous value. The program has so far trained many youths and teachers in the schools where the mobile library outreach is conducted. Leveraging on the school program was a path to other avenues to address. SAIDE has so far mobilized schools to take part in inter-school debate challenges, reading contests and so far the outcome is impressive- there has been substantive improvement in school performance and the general reading culture is reawakened. Furthermore, it has been a launching pad for other initiatives. The most notable one is the sanitary pad distribution initiative to those children whose parents can’t afford the commodity. SAIDE has a key interest in other disciplines like health, agriculture and social change. We have done community service programs that’s cleaning of markets.

COLLABORATIONS AND PARTNERS

SAIDE, being a community based organization, is a people driven organization hence the key stakeholder is the community. The community owns and is the driving force in all our key initiatives. SAIDE has also endeavored to seek and partner with like-minded friends to make the dream happen and to serve the community better. As such, we have always welcomed on board people, organizations, companies, the government, philanthropists and other stakeholders who aspire to give and do good to the society.

Over the years since inception, SAIDE has worked with many stakeholders. Just to mention a few:

Population Service International Kenya (PSI-K) and Uzima Foundation.

SAIDE demonstrated its interest in health two years and entered in to agreement with Uzima Foundation which was implementing a health programme overseen by Population Service International (PSI) Kenya. It was a two year health awareness initiative involving conducting Focused Group Discussions among communities in order to combat Malaria, HIV/AIDS and encourage use of safe water.

Foundation For Sustainable Development (FSD)

SAIDE partnered with FSD whose main role was to facilitate an intern placement with it. In May 2014, SAIDE got an intern, Abhishek Upadhyaya, from Duke University. The intern was instrumental in reimagining and redesigning most of our core works and streamlined the library outreach program and the Computer training to teachers in neighborhood primary schools. In 2015 SAIDE received another intern from Duke University Ankit Kayastha who scaled up the debate in secondary schools. In 2016 we received an intern from Rice University in United States through foundation for sustainable development (FSD) Reilly Brooks from Rice University who helped in development of SAIDE Curriculum document. The document is to help whoever is administering one hour reading culture with fascinating and child friendly activities. In 2017 we had Sarah Park from Rice University who helped in developing a debate database for the adjudicators. In 2018 we had Ying Dai from North Western university, helped with community engagement forums and build on the existing programs. She's also developing a documentary for the library.

Worldreader and the Library E-reading Activities Project(LEAP)

SAIDE partnered with Worldreader International who was part of implementing the Library E-reader Activities Project (LEAP) which was funded through Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The partnership saw SAIDE qualify and become a premier library in the region to have e-readers to support our library. SAIDE was given 25 e-readers each loaded with over 200 books which boosted the library. It further supported our key objective of ensuring proper integration of technology in education. This year we received 35 more E-readers equipped with 200 books each, this has boosted our operating area and the number of people we reach out.

American Friends of Kenya (AFK)

AFK has been one of our most important partners. The organization has donated over 10,000 books with health assistance equipment to the library from different disciplines and which applies to all the age brackets. The resources have been important in implementing the organization’s programs and serve the community better.

DRIVE Network Kenya

DRIVE (Digital Reading for Inclusivity, Versatility and Engagement) is one of 24 new networks funded by UK Research and Innovation’s Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF), a £1.5 billion fund to support cutting-edge research which addresses the problems faced by developing countries. The networks bring together academics, industry, NGOs, policymakers and practitioners from Africa with UK partners to maximise digital technologies to address development challenges including health, energy and accessibility to online resources. The DRIVE project will run from May 2020 to April 2021.

Other key partners:

  • Kenya Alliance for Children Rights
  • Book Aid International

INSTITUTIONAL CAPACITY

SAIDE Group is managed through an 8 member management board which is elected every two years. The group has talented and experienced members who are committed to community based development programmes.