Domingo Savio (Fall 2023)

Project Background

Domingo Savio was founded in 1979 by Olga Diaz as a residential orphanage or “hogar” for children living in Santiago, Chile. Today, Nuestro Club Domingo Savio continues to work with children and their families living in challenging situations through an “after-school” and other enrichment programs.

Olga continues to lead the work of Nuestro Club Domingo Savio with creativity and resourcefulness, as she has done for more than 40 years. Olga and her colleagues remain committed to expanding opportunities for the school-age children who actively participate in Domingo Savio’s educational and enrichment programs, as well as with adult family members and elderly people who often live in isolation in the local community. Mi Club is supported entirely by donations. Increasingly, most "in kind" contributions for food, clothing, and school supplies are local, as are an increasing percentage of monetary donations. They also rely on local interns and international volunteers to lead “talleres” (workshops) for the children after school. Steve Reifenberg lived and worked at Domingo Savio from 1982-1984 and wrote a book about the experiences called “Santiago’s Children: What I Learned about Life at an Orphanage in Chile.” He has remained involved with Domingo Savio, and is chair of the board.

Definition of Opportunity

The primary objective of this project is to develop a way of telling the story of Domingo Savio and its impact on children and their communities, so Domingo Savio is able to better generate support and attract international volunteers. This includes recording the stories of former participants in the programs of Domingo Savio and understanding how the program impacted their lives. The team will use these stories to help update the website and incorporate this storytelling into their design as well as develop more concrete information/expectations and a formal application process for international volunteers.

Definition of Success

We aspire that this DAT project will generate impactful narrative stories of Domingo Savio’s work, with concrete examples of impact and personal testimonies. As a result, Domingo Savio would have an engaging and updated website that would draw in more donations and support. The site would also have a volunteer application process that both encourages more volunteers to come and allows Domingo Savio to better filter prospective volunteers before arrival. They will have a portfolio of testimonies and stories from members of the new program for elderly people experiencing solitude.

Meet the Team

Final Deliverables

Enseña Chile (Spring 2023)

Enhancing Leadership Development in Chilean Schools

Partner Background

The non-profit educational organization, Enseña Chile is promoting a movement to transform opportunities for public school students in Chile. Inspired by Teach for America in the US, Enseña Chile works to develop educational leaders committed to improving access to excellent educational opportunities for students regardless of socio-economic circumstances. Founded in Santiago in 2007 by Enseña Chile CEO Tomas Recart, the organization works to provide quality education for high school students by bringing outstanding university graduates with leadership skills into under-resourced schools. Through its Colegios que Aprenden (CQA) consulting unit, Enseña Chile is working to produce a system-wide impact on issues of educational quality, leadership, and equity.

 

Definition of Opportunity

Over the past ten years, Enseña Chile has partnered with Notre Dame’s International Development in Practice class and the i-Lab Master of Global Affairs program to evaluate best practices and key aspects of supporting educational leaders in Chile. The 2022 i-Lab project examined the role that school leadership plays, and focuses on the key role of principals for enhancing outcomes for students.  In the process, the i-Lab team developed a leadership development tool for principals. This DAT project aspires to explore models that can help disseminate and actively use the tool to promote activities that can support the sharing of good school leadership practices in Chile.  It is critical to define how the tool can be used within the framework of Enseña Chile CQA’s coaching sessions, and more generally to promote leadership and teacher development. 

Definition of Success

Enseña Chile seeks to implement the findings from the i-Lab team report, and find the most effective way principals might use the tool which focuses on three overarching themes: Build Trust, Be Coherent, and Develop a Learning Culture.

Meet the Team

Final Deliverable

Ensena Chile Presentation F23 by Joseph Drey on Scribd

Networks for Social Development - Enseña Chile (Fall 2015)

Client Profile

Enseña Chile is based on the successful Teach for America model, recognized for creating a corps of leaders committed to improving access to excellent education regardless of socio-economic circumstances. Many join straight after finishing college, but others have gathered professional experiences outside the education sector. All applicants need to have demonstrated skills in leading and motivating teams, such as campus initiatives, community organizations or sports teams. Enseña Chile was founded by Tomás Recart in 2007 in Santiago, Chile. The organization provides quality education to 14- to 18-year-old high school students by bringing outstanding university graduates with leadership skills into classrooms of low-quality schools in poor areas for a period of two years. 

Definition of Problem

On a long-term basis, Enseña Chile is promoting a movement/network of Enseña Chile alumni that will be active at key positions in society with the possibility to positively influence a change in the educational system of Chile. Enseña Chile has adapted the model for the Chilean and Latin American context. By bringing bright college graduates and professionals to teach in underprivileged schools, they provide a significant contribution to bridging the inequality gap. Although Enseña Chile believes that good teachers have similar characteristics independent of culture, the organization has been adapting the Teach for America model both in the way these competencies are measured and trained, as well as in teacher training.

Founder Tomás Recart is convinced that in order to achieve social and economic equality it is necessary to systematically incorporate new leadership into the educational system and build broad and diverse networks in doing so. 

Initial Steps and Options

• Enseña Chile is currently working to develop a network in which principals and ECh regularly work together and foster long-term relationships in which ECh would continue to supply the same schools with teachers. ECh feels they hear all the time how OECD and US schools and school systems share work/information and build networks.
• Additional advisors: Stephen Zerfas and Mitch Kochanski, Bridgespan, San Francisco & Andrew Weiler, McKinsey and Company, Minneapolis

Definition of Success

An operational guide on best practices for building effective networks in the educational sector from other countries. Which are the best ideas that might be directly related to Chile?

Recommendation

Presentation

Impact of Volunteer Organizations - América Solidaria (Fall 2013)

Client Profile

América Solidaria aims to promote effective volunteer engagement among the countries of the Americas. The main objective of the organization is to promote regional and multilateral development between the different countries of the continent. América Solidaria aims to accomplish this through volunteer networks of young professionals who work with a sense of professionalism and social awareness to promote social integration and solidarity in the countries where they have been placed.  Founded in Chile, América Solidaria now works throughout South America and the Caribbean and would like to extend the scope of its work to include the United States.

See all Development Advisory Team projects with América Solidaria

Definition of Problem

Today there are volunteers coming from five different countries, but there is no consistent application, selection or support system across countries. This is an issue that needs to be addressed and remedied. Considering the first report and analysis by students of the “Development Advisory Teams” (spring 2013), America Solidaria would like to continue to deepen the analysis and the design of their volunteer programs, comparing their work with similar initiatives in the United States, especially as it relates to the application process, screening, selection and support Specifically, America Solidaria are interested in the following areas of analysis:

A. Models and Systems for Volunteer Nominations: A review of the application processes of organizations similar to American Solidaria (on timing of placement, phasing, duration, required documentation etc.) and tools used and how these tools allow them to streamline application processes.

B. Selection Process and Evaluation of Volunteers: Review of different models of selection of volunteers, stages, selection criteria and indicators of successful selection that includes looking at the impact that these volunteers make.

C. Volunteers Accompaniment Processes: Finally a review of the processes accompanying the volunteers once they start their work in their respective destinations.

Initial Steps and Options

América Solidaria would like a team of students to consider what other similar organizations have done when facing these challenges of identification, selection, placement, and measuring impact of their volunteers.  Organizations of particular interest include:

• Peace Corps
• Atlas Corps
• Global Health Corps
• Jesuit Volunteer Corps

Students on this DAT project will also work together with computer science students from Notre Dame engineering Prof. Raul Santelices’ class on some more technical aspects of building a software system for recruitment and selection of volunteers.  Many of the materials are in Spanish, so it would be helpful if some team members have a knowledge of Spanish.

Recommendation

Environmental Sustainability - Program on Conservation Innovation (Fall 2013)

Client Profile

The mission of the Harvard Forest Program on Conservation Innovation (PCI) is to build knowledge about highly effective conservation science, education, governance, protection, and stewardship practices and to communicate that knowledge to conservation practitioners, decision makers, and citizens in the United States as well as across the globe.

The PCI has five overarching goals:

1. to conduct research that informs advanced conservation practice and focuses attention on the outstanding innovation in the field
2. to educate present-day and future conservation practitioners and involved citizenry regarding emerging approaches to conserving land, water, and biodiversity
3. to award and recognize exemplary conservation initiatives
4. to convene focused leadership dialogues on critical conservation challenges and inventive solutions commensurate with those challenges, and
5. to broadly communicate with a global audience regarding important conservation innovations that may be commensurate with the complex challenges of our day.

See all Development Advisory Team projects with Program on Conversation Innovation

Definition of Problem

There are many opportunities for renewable energy (especially solar and wind) in Chile’s northern region just beginning to be explored.  Developing new power sources, of course, will also have an impact on the environment.  However, there is little analysis about the opportunities and trade-offs in sustainable energy development and its impact on the environment. In both the conservation and energy areas, there are increasing networks between the Chile and the US that lead to sharing the experience and expertise. Chile could serve as a model for alternative energy development, including in its energy siting regulations and the successful integration of biodiversity offsets on sites in which biodiversity habitat is compromised or damaged. (Explore how to use experience elsewhere to influence siting on energy sites so as to mitigate impact on the environment.)

Initial Steps and Options

• Explore energy and mitigation policies now in place, as well as the potential for policies or pilot projects which might be developed in Chile with representatives of the private sector, the non-governmental organization (NGO) sector, the public sector, and the academic sector.
• Explore international precedents for addressing such issues, including the emergence of renewable energy siting and mitigation policies at the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (e.g., Kit Muller, Director of Strategic Planning, US Bureau of Land Management) (see, for example: http://blmsolar.anl.gov/; see also:http://solareis.anl.gov/news/index.cfm#solarprogram).
• Explore financial analyst assessments of the potential for renewable energy developments in Chile (for example, see reports of Deutsche Bank analysis that the photovoltaic market in Chile is at or near “grid parity” with other sources of electric power at http://reneweconomy.com.au/2013/deutsche-sees-chile-as-first-subsidy-free-big-solar-market-79342)
• Explore the potential of photovoltaic and water desalinization technologies now in early development stages at MIT (the Massachusetts Institute of Technology) to transform the economies of arid regions such as northern Chile (for example, see information on the relevant articles at http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/how-to-get-fresh-water-out-of-thin-air-0830.html and at http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/thinner-solar-panels-0626.html.
• It is important that at least some members of the group speak Spanish.

Recommendation