Community Engagement is one of EGST’s major commitments together with teaching and research. It encompasses the interaction between EGST and wider society on local, national, and global levels and enables us to be holistic in our services. Our work in Community Engagement creates opportunities for faculty, staff, students, and the wider community to serve and develop local capacity. This third Strategic Pillar for 2016-200 is managed by the Development and Communications Department
As a socially engaged institution, EGST draws on its research and teaching-learning capacity to serve Ethiopia and the world with professional colleagues, students, and partners from churches, civil society, government, and beyond to address local and global challenges.
Our basic goal is to develop meaningful relationships with our community for mutual benefit and the common. Our specific objectives include engaging civic debate, influencing policy, linking research and teaching with social institutions and communities, and contributing to community wellbeing by 2020.
EGST’s Community Engagement has been improving over the years in fulfillment of our commitment to serving church and society. EGST students are continuously getting engaged with different institutions including churches, NGOs, public offices, para-church groups and community based organizations.
These opportunities help our students not only change theory into practice but also contribute to improving their expertise as researchers, trainers, counselors, and practitioners. Some students travel to rural and urban centers to interact with government experts, church ministers, and community members. Others get involved in field-based empirical research.
EGST Projects and Community Services now include Maternal and Newborn Child Health Projects in Nifas Silk Lafto Sub City Addis Ababa, and Holeta Town Administration in the Oromia Regional State. Together with World Vision Ethiopia, EGST is involved in training FBO leaders in an intervention on Channels of Hope for Maternal and New Born Children Health in fifteen Area Programs/districts in Addis Ababa, Oromia and Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples’ Regional States (SNNPR).
EGST has also graduated 220 congregational and fellowship leaders in Gender, Health and Theology as change agents in their congregations and communities. This will continue to grow and include more church fellowships, denominations and community leaders. Five public teacher education colleges and other four theological seminaries in (SNNPR) are working closely with EGST on Education for Sustainable Development. This is implemented together with the EGST Centre for Environmental Stewardship and Holistic Development, CESHoD.
EGST also cultivates street trees and sets an example in supporting green, sustainable city initiatives. EGST’s motto, Love Your City, will be strengthened in the coming years with the Addis Ababa city government. In our Environmental Stewardship Policy and Practice, we have launched solid waste segregation at in our built environment and will expand this to district and sub city levels.
EGST faculty, staff, and students continue to contribute financial and other resources to support the needy, especially at the Addis Ababa Juvenile Delinquency Rehabilitation Centre. These contributions purchase shoes and other basic materials for teenagers who are undergoing rehabilitation in the correctional administration system. We are strengthening this initiative now.
We wish to express our deep gratitude to our partners and supporters who labor with us. We are committed to serving our community and achieving sustainable development goals for the present and future with a special focus on women, children, the disabled, the sick, families, and rural farmers. Together, we aspire to see a world freed from poverty, hunger and disease for holistic human flourishing.