Community Empowerment and Adult Literacy through REFLECT Methodology: Lessons from Mumias, Kenya

Community empowerment generally and the empowerment of women particularly, is recognized as an essential precondition for the elimination of world poverty and respect of human rights, while literacy is regarded as a foundation for reducing poverty. Moreover, it is widely accepted that literacy is not only a fundamental human right but also a basic tool for making informed decisions and participating meaningfully in the development of society. But poverty reduction through promotion of gender equality and empowerment of women is an international target to which the Kenya Government is committed, as reflected in diverse policy documents and a number of development and poverty reduction projects in the Country that have been initiated by Non Governmental Organizations and funded by Kenyas development partners. The Mumias Education for Empowerment (MEFE) project, implemented in the western region of Kenya by the Anglican Church with funding from the Department for International Development (DFID), is one such project that sought to contribute to the achievement of international targets of poverty reduction, through community empowerment, using an adult literacy programme that applied the REFLECT approach. This paper reports on findings based on a study that examined the project purpose, objectives, approach and outputs. It highlights project impact, including a qualitative assessment of the pedagogical impact and conscientisational impact, and draws lessons for future similar projects.