Connector Articles, Maternal and Child Health
SCOPE Project Brings MNCH to Community Level
Funded through USAID’s New Partnerships Initiative, the recently completed Strengthening Community Health Outcomes through Positive Engagement (SCOPE) Project was a five-year project implemented in Haiti, Kenya, Malawi, and South Sudan. The project sought to make reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health (RMNCH) services readily available at the community level. CCIH partnered with World Relief, the prime partner, for the first three years of the SCOPE project to identify local organizations in Kenya, Malawi, and South Sudan to complement World Relief’s efforts in SCOPE geographic areas.
CCIH monitored the SCOPE activities implemented by the Christian Health Associations in Kenya (CHAK) and the Christian Health Association of Malawi (CHAM), which are CCIH members and local partners, as well as the Organization for People’s Empowerment and Needs (OPEN), a local non-governmental organization based in South Sudan.
Project Impact and Stories
SCOPE’s Final Project Report shares its impact in reducing preventable maternal and child mortality and morbidity in the four project countries. It highlights innovative approaches such as engaging community health workers, faith leaders, and community groups to widen access to reproductive, maternal, newborn, and child health services at the community level.
World Relief’s blog post Empowering Communities, Transforming Lives: The SCOPE Project Journey, written by Eeva Sallinen Simard, SCOPE Project Director, and Devina Shah, RMNCH Senior Technical Advisor, World Relief, emphasizes SCOPE’s success in mobilizing faith leaders and community groups to address barriers like cultural misconceptions and limited access to quality care.
To further share lessons learned from the project, the Christian Journal for Global Health recently published Strengthening Organizational Capacity in Kenya, Malawi, and South Sudan, about organization capacity building for implementing partners as part of SCOPE. Authors from CCIH, the Christian Health Association of Kenya, and the Organization for People’s Empowerment and Needs explored how the grant makers’ investment in strengthening the organizational capacity of their implementing partners results in the grantees having improved internal systems and being better positioned to obtain and execute future grant opportunities.
Above Photo: SCOPE Community Health Volunteers in Lowarengak Community in Kenya, with Ministry of Health Sub-County Staff and CCIH Program Director Mona Bormet.