Multi country link & learn facilitation towards an inclusive world
In The Constellations newest partnership, Voice and The Constellation collaborate to facilitate a learning from experience process between 19 rightsholder groups that have their activities in Cambodia, Indonesia, Kenya, Laos, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Tanzania, The Philippines, and Uganda. Their activities are aimed at reaching an inclusive world through emancipation and listening to all: lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) people, people with disability, vulnerable elderly and youth, women facing exploitation, abuse, and/or violence, and indigenous people and ethnic minorities.
The Constellation, during the next two years will help these groups to express who they are, what they are proud of and what they have learned in stories and with self-filmed ‘Visual Journeys’, supported by David and Jessica from Visual Development. We will link them with the other groups for systematic learning during SALT visits and regional events. People who do not live nearby will join online. Joint learning will also happen on The Constellation Learning platform under development.
This partnership is a big opportunity for the network: The Constellation members and teams will be invited to join events and share their experiences at relevant moments.
The partnership is governed by the Gov4Voice team: Miel Nora and Marlou de Rouw for Project Management, Linda Yuliantini and Dolores Rey Novoa for Finance and Admin, Meble Birengo and Luc Barrière-Constantin will lead the team for Linking and Learning, while Autry Haynes facilitates Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning and Eddy Charles gives technical support to the process.
The inception period started on the 1st of March 2021. During this period, the Gov4Voice team worked closely with Voice to create the Link and Learn process and to understand each other’s procedures.
Local teams of experienced SALT facilitators facilitated the first conversation with the rightsholder groups: ‘Who are we?’ during the month of April. They are all based in the countries where the Voice programme is active: Arthur, Clement, Gerlita, Jay, Joy, Margaret, Myrna, Sangaré, Seydou, Wiwin, Zablon, and Widad.
Representatives of the 19 Voice multi-country grantee projects joined the Kick-Off event for a joint Link and Learn Journey on the 25th of April 2022. The Constellation team outlined the road map for the journey that has joint stops during Learn Visits and Regional Events. The Constellation facilitators will support each grantee so that they come prepared for those events and apply the learning in their context.
The online event also was an opportunity for the 78 participants from 14 countries to start to get to know each other. It had powerful interpretations for French, Bahasa Indonesia, Lao as well as Vietnamese and Lao sign language.
Grantee participants expressed their hope and expectations for the Link and Learn process that is now officially started:
“My hope is for a connection where we can come together to learn something that we can pick up and use in our own context. Learning should help marginalised people to have access to their rights.” Rattanak, Woman Peace Maker – Statelessness, Cambodia
By Marlou De Rouw.
“We are excited by this important opportunity which may help us to strengthen our network of local teams and the work we are doing with the communities as a whole.”
Luc Barriere-Constantin
Meble Birengo of The Constellation meeting with the Voice team in Nairobi.
Voice is a grant facility, initiative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands executed by a consortium between Oxfam Novib and Hivos.
