Within 15 minutes of touchdown, I collected my baggage, zoomed through an empty passport control and was hit with the wave of humidity indicative of a return to countries around the equator. “Welcome to Africa, my friend!” My colleague greeted me with a big hug (a social custom in Rwanda that caught me off guard). The next morning, at the hotel breakfast service I tried “African tea” and felt I burnt my tongue with how strongly gingery it tasted – colleagues later explained that tea is served strong and then individually diluted with water – an example of the numerous daily differences I was to experience in my first time in Africa. But a visit to the Genocide Memorial Museum as part of my first few days’ induction showed me the cultural sensitivity of Rwanda and the historical complexity and uniqueness of each individual African country (an aspect I have found many westerners overlook).

My Leadership in Action project with VSO Rwanda was a holistic and constant learning experience – adapting to a novel country and continent and immersing myself in a new industry (international development). My role was to create a report assessing the progress of one of their development programs and thereby evaluate possible reforms. The program focused on encouraging the use of Learn Through Play teaching techniques across Rwanda in Early Childhood Education (ages 3-6) through mentoring teachers, engaging with relevant decision makers and raising awareness in the community. More specifically, I was to assess the disability inclusion aspect of the program through field visits, interviews, reading field reports and observing teacher trainings.

The funder of the program, The Lego Foundation requested our impact and learnings be evaluated across 3 outcomes (leaders, schools and community) and much of the nature of the work was shaped around / limited by these guiding outcomes – highlighting the dependency of the development industry on the desires of funders. The guidelines for the program given by the funder, I found in my report, were one of the reasons why a dedicated disability inclusion aspect only began around halfway into the project, with VSO eager to satisfy the holistic nature of the guidelines in order to secure funding in the first place.

Recognizing my role as a short-term researcher, I thought it was important to make a conscious effort to present my report’s suggestions as both feasible but also applicable to other future programs VSO may want to pursue to give my work the highest chance of being impactful. Presenting my findings at the VSO Rwanda Reflection and Planning week some points I made included

•  increasing awareness around mental disability should be the priority in disability focused programs given its lacking in the Rwandan context
• VSO should be more confident in presenting progressive proposals that focus on disadvantaged communities such as those with disabilities and leverage their success in past disability projects to justify such a proposal,
• the use of local volunteers for engaging with local stakeholders rather than international ones is a business model that should be maintained or extended in the future due to the local volunteers’ abilities to foster trust and therefore sustainability of development programs with local communities.

These suggestions among others were made applicable to a range of different potential development programs that VSO may pursue. I am incredibly proud of the feedback I received from colleagues as my project supervisor recently informed me that my report was used a lot in VSO's annual project report to the Lego Foundation!

In terms of leadership learning this experience highlighted to me the fields of leadership beyond the interpersonal. Advocacy to local government for a disadvantaged community can be a form of leadership for said community. Being the first NGO to focus specifically on disability inclusion in pre-primary education can be a form of leadership in the development world. Having the initiative to pursue a daunting experience can be a form of leadership that encourages others to try similar experiences. Being a proactive presence to someone in a daunting experience can be an understated form of leadership. My work was largely self-led and individualised, but the novelty of my situation showed to me that leadership is often more about leading by example than direct interpersonal engagement.

Intellectually and professionally stimulating, my time with VSO Rwanda has given me an interest in the world of international development and seeing first hand the stark differences between development contexts and daily life in London has shown me its critical importance. However, the main learning experience and takeaways were definitely from the experience of living by myself in Rwanda. Zipping around Kigali on moto taxis, experiencing Rwandan nightlife, navigating markets for groceries where my visible foreignness made me a target for upmarked prices and experiencing a presidential election I was sure to immerse myself in Rwandan life. At first I was daunted by transport, method of payment, food and a range of other basics but the amazing friends and colleagues I met gave me the confidence to make the most out of 6 weeks which went incredibly quickly. Having successfully completed the international LiA I feel more confident in my self-sustainability, more apt at cross cultural communication, more sensitive to the development world and excited to travel and discover more. The experience has made me eager to go on a year abroad and keen to discover the global diversity that is to be uncovered once you leave TFL zone 1.

Rwanda is a country blanketed in hills which means a vast and beautiful view is always around the corner. It is an energetic emerging country with a youthful vibrant culture as well as an air of solemnity concerning its past. It is a country whose people will welcome you with open arms and a country I hope to return to. I would like to extend my thanks to Pontien and Jean-Bosco my Rwandan uncles who supported me pastorally and logistically, to Rachel, Eva and Michel who understood how daunting the experience was and introduced me to many parts of the country, to Sincere, Daisy and Payge who became my friends in Kigali and explored the city with me, to Rebecca who facilitated the  LiA from the VSO side and welcomed me to Africa and finally to Sarah who was my point of contact for the whole experience who advised me throughout.