{"id":232,"date":"2025-08-09T20:31:31","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T20:31:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ulemu.com\/?page_id=232"},"modified":"2026-01-20T22:53:18","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T22:53:18","slug":"chisi","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/ulemu.com\/?page_id=232","title":{"rendered":"Chisi Island"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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How it started..<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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In 2019, following Cyclone Idai, which affected more than 500,000 Malawians, Evin Joyce visited remote islands across Southern Malawi, including Chisi Island, as part of a UN recovery operation.<\/p>

Hunger, unaffordable access to healthcare and an absence of schools were the most common complaints across the communities he visited. With similar uniformity, one community asset stood out: local women running outdoor preschools, with almost no support.<\/p>

When Evin asked his sister, Ailbhe, a trained primary school teacher \u201cWhat could support these preschool teachers right now,\u00a0at very low cost?\u201d School in an Envelope was born.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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School in an envelope<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Ailbhe arrived in Malawi in 2020 to design, test and distribute sets of low-cost, laminated flashcards to help these untrained preschool teachers improve early literacy and numeracy. As well the physical sets of flashcards, Ailbhe\u2019s aim was to develop and document the minimum amount of the most effective training these women needed to use the flashcards optimally and show women in other communities how to use them so that the project could grow.<\/p>

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COVID-19, \u2018Masks for Malawi\u2019 & the \u2018Lifesavers Club\u2019<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Covid-19 derailed the \u2018School in an Envelope\u2019 project as preschools were ordered to close. Communities\u2019 priorities shifted to protecting their vulnerable and elderly. People needed masks and soap, and food to help those infected isolate at home without suffering from hunger. Evin and Ailbhe\u2019s family in Ireland launched a GoFundMe page named Masks4Malawi that quickly received more than \u20ac20,000 in donations plus a grant of \u20ac7,500 from Ireland\u2019s Embassy to Malawi. Working with the same preschool teachers, village chiefs, out-of-school children, and staff from local clinics, and a missionary priest from Donegal based in Malawi since 1981, the Lifesavers Club was formed and distributed more than 50,000 locally-made masks and bars of soap, and supported dozens of Covid patients self-isolating with food packages across more than 120 villages in Zomba District.<\/p>

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Post-Covid pivot back to chronic challenges and Chisi Island<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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When Covid ended, the chronic challenges facing children\u2019s health, education and nutrition persisted. Generous private donations continued to flow in, plus a grant of \u20ac8,000 from Irish National Teachers\u2019 Organisation and \u20ac7,000 from the Meitheal diocese youth leadership programme.<\/p>

Ailbhe recommenced testing the \u2018School in an Envelope\u2019 model with preschools on the mainland. Evin decided to move to Chisi Island with its population of around 4,000 people to attempt to develop a low-cost, sustainable, community-driven approach to improve children\u2019s health, education and nutrition. Why do it on Chisi Island? Because the communities on the island are among the world\u2019s poorest, most isolated and most vulnerable to climate change. If the UN\u2019s mantra for the Sustainable Development Goals is to \u2018serve the furthest behind first\u2019 this meant the children of Chisi Island should be first in line. The island\u2019s relatively static and isolated population enables detailed monitoring of the spending required to make improvements. The idea was that by rigorously monitoring costs and benefits, solutions developed on the island can be replicated and scaled-up elsewhere.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Chisi Island<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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