African Rural University Students are Improving Farming Communities’ Livelihoods during Internship Using Community Action Planning in the Albertine Region, Uganda

Abstract

Community Action Planning (CAP) develops capacity of grass-root communities to create the change they desire. African Rural University (ARU) students are deployed in villages for internship program to facilitate change and acquire hands-on experience in conducting CAP with rural farming communities. Using the Epicenter Strategy (ES), ARU internship students (interns) were deployed in 11 Sub Counties in Kagadi, Kibaale and Kakumiro districts for two academic semesters to help villages plan and implement projects using CAP. They used visionary planning approach to generate visions and required actions from the communities. The methods used in CAP included; brainstorming, group discussions, and plenary discussions. The students were mentored in the field by Epicenter Managers (EMs) and supervised on a bi weekly basis by a faculty supervisor and a Traditional Wisdom Specialist (TWS). They (the students) prepared an internship report of all projects initiated and presented the achieved results to the communities, local government and faculty staff before submitting the reports to ARU for assessment. The authors used one report of the internship conducted at Birembo Sub County and prepared this paper. The key results highlighted in this work include; communities initiated own projects in agriculture, health, education, transport and environmental conservation at individual, household, group, community or Sub County levels. The ARU intern student contributed to the effectiveness and efficiency of service delivery at Sub County during the internship. The intern learned and conducted CAP thus enhanced her capacity to cause a democratic bottom up planning process for effective rural transformation. The intern enabled people to learn and acquire skills in the visionary approach to improve their livelihoods. There is need for more CAP sessions to follow-up, monitor the initiated projects or even start new ones.