ANNUAL REPORT 2010 * Listening * Telling true stories * Addressing adolescent and adult sexuality In 2010 STF sadly said farewell to Charlotte Kanstrup when she returned to Copenhagen. Seen above with clients at Gulu Youth Centre, Charlotte was Counsellor of Development at Danida in Kampala from 2005 to 2010. She was an ardent supporter of STF’s model, and STF is immensely grateful for the guidance she provided. ABBREVIAtions Straight Talk radio shows capture deeply private moments. STF Board of DIRECTORS AMYC Amuru Youth center Interviews are conducted in huts, AJYC Ajumani Youth Center classsrooms, clinics and small ARVs Anti Retrovirals living rooms and under trees. BCC Behaviour Change Communication They are assembled into shows CCTs Centre Coordinating Tutors in STF’s Kampala studio. CSF Civil Society Fund DATIC District Agricultural Training and Information Center DEOs District Education Officers Straight Talk Foundation (STF) is a Ugandan NGO, DHOs District Health Officers set up in 1997. It grew out of a teen newspaper, Chair: Aggrey Charles Odere, Rev Gideon GYC Gulu Youth Center Straight Talk, started in 1993. Today it practises Kibenge, Under Advocate, Lex Uganda Byamugisha, FGD Focus Group Discussion COMMunicAtion foR SociAL CHAngE. Secretary, MoES Christian Aid HCT HIV Counseling and Testing IPPF International Planned Parenthood Federation Its main focus is PREVEnting HIV in KYC Kitgum Youth Center ADOLEscEnts. MoES Ministry of Education and Sports MOU Memorandum of Understanding STF also supports PAREnts and TEACHERS NUREP Northern Uganda Rehabilitation Program to have safer and healthier sexual lives and to help PACE Programs for Accessible Health , Communication and Education PIASCY Presidential Initiative on AIDS Strategy for Communication to Youth adolescent have safer transitions to adulthood. STF PPET Post-primary education and training adheres to a KnoW YouR EPidEMic- knoW Mondo Kyateka, Anne Akia Feidler, Catharine Watson, PS Primary School YouR RESPonsE approach and follows a SEXUAL Assistant Chief of Party, USAID President, STF PWDs Persons With Disabilities Commissioner for Communications HEALTH promotion model. Youth, MoGLSD Support for Health, R&E Research and Evaluation Zambia SGBV Sexual and Gender Based Violence SRH Adolescent Sexual Reproductive Health In 2010 STF worked in 17 LAnguAGES. STF STI Sexually Transmitted Infection communicates through and SS Secondary School RAdio, PRint FACE- STF Straight Talk Foundation to-FACE. STF is concerned for the well-being of all UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization adolescents and their families. However, it is particularly UNFPA United Nations Fund for Population Activities concerned about the most-at-risk, especially GIRLS, Oliva Muhumuza, Headteacher, Railway UNICEF United Nations Fund for Children Children’s PS UNITY Ugandan Initiative for TDMS and PIASCY ORPHAns, adolescents living WitH HIV or with WILD Wildlife Landscapes and Development for Communication SPEciAL NEEds, and adolescents in complex Dr Frank Kaharuza, Justina Kihika, Susan Ajok, Olivia represented the board at Tree Talk’s Director, Research, Freelance Executive Director, one millionth tree event in August 2010. She 4RS Runyankore/Rukiga/Runyoro/Rutooro environments such as fisHing coMMunitiES. CDC/UVRI Consultant STF is seen here with a Muvle seedling. Table of Contents Message from the President 2 Message from the ED 3 PRINT 4 Positive dignity 7 ST & YT in Braille 8 Letters/distribution 10 ST and YT at a glance 12-13 TREE TALK & FARM TALK 14 1 RADIO 18 A Straight Talk radio trip 22 ST radio brings changes 23 Parent Talk testifies 24 Parent Talk saving marriages 25 Radio letters/Maps 26-27 Radio topics & partnerships 28 FACE-TO-FACE 29 Outreach and training 30 Teachers’ fairs, sensitization 33 Working with CBOs 34 Youth centres 35 Special needs & Batwa 40 National interns/volunteers 41 2 International colleagues 41 RESEARCH & EVALUATION 42 FINANCE/ADMINISTRATION 45 3 STF is all about activism, personal warmth, conviction, solidarity and talk. 1 In the top photo, STF’s Jacki Alesi, 25, laughs with students of Arua SS. “They had asked me about using two condoms,” she Above: a young girl with Down’s Syndrome says. “We were enjoying the discussion.” expresses her thoughts at an STF workshop at Kireka Home for the Mentally Handicapped. 2 In the middle photo, STF’s Runyoro-Rutooro radio journalist, Juliet Kabahuguzi, 20, demonstrates condom use to a group of Says Quinta Apiyo, who runs STF’s work students in Tororo. in special needs, “She was complaining that boda boda men deceive girls that they are wanted at home and then take 3 In the bottom photo, Parent Talk Ateso journalist Ruth Achope, 30, talks earnestly to parents in Kabermaido. The conversations them and rape them.” can never finish. STF 2010 Annual Report 1 Message from the President his is my seventh always fail unless they are accompanied by talk. Tannual report for STF. Since the report We also want to justify talking about sex in 17 languages is a painstaking and account for what we did with the $3.4 million of yearly audit of foreign taxpayers money that donors gave us in 2010. We everything that we would not spend it the way we do if we did not think it tried to do in the “works” – after all the money could be used for schools previous 12 months or cash transfers. The research and evaluation section is -- and not a PR particularly dense. But today donors and charity watchers exercise, the writing such as “Givewell” and “Good Intentions are Not Enough” never gets easier. demand far more than an intuition that something works. I run up and down Givewell notes that less than 10% of international charities stairs in our Kampala follow proven approaches and insists that charities exhibit building, asking an unusual degree of transparency, publicly disclose “How many radio failed programmes, systematically commit to publishing stations aired us evaluations, and provide a complete picture of how for free? How many money is spent. people did we reach?” And I shake my head sadly, when our data seems improbable or reveals a problem. “We This does not daunt us. Our approach is proven, and treated 4000 adolescents for STIs but gave out only 1000 public disclosure is what this report is all about. For condoms? What is happening here?” instance, we are open that we provided PEP to fewer adolescents in 2010 than in 2009 and are not happy about But writing the annual report is also deeply satisfying. it. I need a letter that shows how little 12 year olds know about AIDS yet how large sex already looms in their lives, Today the gold standard is randomized controlled and our letter team hands me a pile in seconds. I sit with evaluations. But where would STF find an unexposed staff, looking for the perfect image that captures what control group? Givewell concedes, however, that some we do. “Wow, what was happening here?” I ask, as we NGOs have “macro stories” that provide evidence without click through photos on a computer. separating people into treatment and control groups. “Programs are considered promising when they are I hear stories I had not heard before, of our staff going associated with past demonstrated success in improving deeper into villages and conversations than I ever people’s lives.” STF has many such stories. imagined. “You guys are amazing,” I chide. “Why didn’t you tell me you did that?” I find out that Quinta used $75 STF addresses HIV in the context of sexuality and of her per diem to rent a field for landless “pygmies”. I sexuality in the context of culture. So in 2010 I was excited see that in condom demos, young people now hook the to attend UNFPA’s Global Consultation on Sexuality dildo into the front of their trousers as our field workers Education. But I clashed with colleagues from UNESCO, run a commentary on “correct and consistent” use. “Is Population Council and IPPF over their new sexuality that embarrassing?” I ask. “No,” they answer, smiling and education guidelines. As they told me Straight Talk was unfazed. anti-sex, I told them that their curricula underplay the consequences of sex for adolescents in countries with We asked Fred Womakuyu, Uganda’s most meticulous generalized HIV epidemics, little contraception and much documenter of social reality, to take annual leave from early marriage. The New Vision where he is a senior feature writer, and travel around Uganda and impartially enquire about us. One curricula states that “There is no right age to have I wanted to know how a radio show can cause people sex. Each person has to determine when he or she feels to form a club and how a child perceives our papers. ready.” STF believes, in contrast, that there may not be a His findings appear in “boxes”. What strikes me most is right age but there are certainly wrong ages, such as early the simplicity of what people told him. They really did adolescence or when you entirely depend upon parents not know that it was OK to talk to their wife about sex for school fees. Sex, especially for girls, puts an end to or that a husband or wife sometimes does not feel like education, which is the greatest promoter of well-being. intercourse. They learnt that from our parent radio show. We parted as friends, but with much on our minds. If this report seems heavy and pedantic, it is because I thank STF’s managers and staff for their terrific work the work is heavy and we want to make our case that in 2010 and our board and donors for being so generous mass media interventions are essential for preventing towards us. HIV: ideas are even more important than services, and biomedical interventions (PMTCT, HCT and others) almost Catharine Watson 2 STF 2010 Annual Report Message from the Executive Director traight Talk Foundation had a successful year in 2010.