Empowering Future Environmental Problem Solvers through STEM Education Our Mission
At CRDI, we are dedicated to fostering education, advocacy, and capacity building within schools, colleges, universities, and marginalized communities including young women and girls. We believe that equipping individuals with robust STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) knowledge and skills is crucial for addressing the environmental challenges our world faces today.
The Challenge
Our planet is grappling with significant environmental issues like climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss. Solving these problems requires innovative solutions, driven by a well-educated population with strong STEM capabilities. Unfortunately, many educational institutions, particularly in marginalized communities, lack the resources to provide effective STEM education focused on environmental problem-solving. While CRDI believes on the inclusive development, young women and girls have been experiencing the lowest performance in STEM due to social and cultural barriers which ostracize them. This makes them vulnerable to excel and participate in the climate change and resilience initiatives and hence jeopardizing full realization of SDGs.
Our Objectives
- Enhance STEM Education: Integrate environmental learning into STEM curricula at all educational levels.
- Promote the culture of equal competence on STEM: Ensure marginalized populations participate in STEM with focus on young women and girls from primary, secondary, technical colleges to tertiary education level. The objective is meant to inculcate self-esteem among young women and girls to fully participate in all STEM initiatives for realization of climate change and resilience.
- Build Educator Capacity: Provide teachers with the necessary training and resources to teach STEM subjects effectively, emphasizing environmental issues and how STEM is linked and mainstreamed in climate change and resilience.
- Empower Marginalized Communities: Ensure access to high-quality STEM education and environmental problem-solving opportunities for students and local communities in underserved areas.
- Promote Advocacy and Awareness: Highlight the importance of STEM education in tackling environmental challenges and advocate for supportive policies.
Our Programs
- Curriculum Development: In collaboration with relevant government authorities, to create and distribute comprehensive STEM curricula that include environmental problem-solving projects and activities.
- Teacher Training Workshops: Offering workshops to train educators in modern STEM teaching methods and the integration of environmental topics.
- Student Engagement Programs: Organizing science clubs, competitions, and hands-on projects that encourage students to develop solutions to real-world environmental issues.
- Inclusive STEM: with special focus on young women, girls and other vulnerable populations, to promote and build the capacity of the marginalized groups with relevant skills, knowledge and awareness in view of STEM and its relevance to climate change and resilience.
- Community Outreach: Implementing programs to boost STEM literacy and environmental awareness in marginalized communities.
- Partnerships and Collaborations: Working with schools, universities, government bodies, and other non-profits to extend the reach and impact of our initiatives.
Expected Impact
- Enhanced STEM skills among students.
- Increased teacher effectiveness in delivering STEM education.
- Increased participation of the marginalized groups like women, girls and other vulnerable groups in climate change and resilience for inclusive development.
- Greater student involvement in environmental projects.
- Heightened community awareness and advocacy for environmental issues.
- Empowered communities better equipped to address local environmental challenges.
Measuring Our Success
We use a comprehensive monitoring and evaluation framework to assess the impact of our programs. We track:
- The number of students and teachers involved.
- Improvements in student STEM performance.
- Number of vulnerable population uplifted to participate in STEM for inclusive development.
- Results based management system as informed by our internal and external evaluation. The internal evaluation process includes annual participatory review (APR) in which communities, stakeholders and staff assess the impact of our programs.
- Feedback from participants on curriculum and training effectiveness.
- Success stories of student-led environmental projects.
- Community engagement levels in environmental advocacy.
Join Us in Making a Difference
We invite you to support CRDI in our mission to enhance STEM knowledge and skills in environmental learning and problem-solving. Your contribution will enable us to expand our programs, reach more communities, and cultivate the next generation of environmental innovators.
Together, we can create a sustainable future through the power of STEM education.
For more information or to support our initiatives, please contact us or visit our website at www.crdi.or.tz and social media X and LinkedIn