The Global Health Initiative

Undergraduate Public Health major Zill Parikh reflects on her time in Dar es Salaam, working at the Ubongo Production Studios.
 

Ubongo, which means “brain” in Swahili,  is Africa’s number one producer of kids’ edutainment cartoon television shows. Their mission is to foster learning in children ages 3-13 through fun and unique characters and storylines. Based in Tanzania, Ubongo produces two hit shows: Akili and Me, tailored for ages 3-6, and Ubongo Kids for ages 7-13. Akili and Me focuses on teaching younger audiences the basics like letters, numbers, and shapes through games and catchy songs that will forever remain engraved in your memory. Ubongo Kids teaches a variety of STEM topics and important life skills for this age group.

This summer, I had the opportunity to travel to Tanzania and work on pre-production material for next year’s season of Akili and Me. My work mainly focused on researching the causes of under 5 mortality in East Africa (specifically in Tanzania) and formatting that information into prototypes to test with small groups young kids. Based on the feedback received from the kids, we created informational and entertaining ways that the content could be written into the script as 2-3 minute segments and taught through the show’s beloved cartoon characters.

Nutrition, handwashing, and road safety were the three topics we settled on after reading many studies about malnutrition and road traffic related deaths. Akili and Me already had a handwashing song created, so we tailored the segments around discussing the different times children should absolutely wash their hands. We did the same for road safety and created situations in which the cartoon characters could cross the road safely. For nutrition, we decided to focus on characterizing foods as good and bad, explaining that there are many different types of foods that make us “big and strong.”

I had a few smaller projects on the side which included writing grants and gathering research on topics that Ubongo Kids plans to tackle in the future such as female genital mutilation, female empowerment, consent, gender rights, dengue fever, schistosomiasis, and tuberculosis. Researching these topics and creating possible storylines for the show was pretty neat because I already had some background knowledge thanks to my public health classes. It’s refreshing to see that the things we learn in school are actually applicable in the real world!

I’ll say that this was certainly an interesting experience because I didn’t realize the amount of work that goes into something as seemingly simple as a cartoon TV show. I’ve had previous experience working with young kids in Sierra Leone through an on campus student organization called Public Health Without Borders. I taught health education workshops through hands-on activities, so this time around I found it difficult to approach teaching through a media platform. Tapping into the creative side of my brain was something I’m not used to doing. Needless to say, I still enjoyed working on that project because it challenged me to step outside of my comfort zone and try new things in the world of health education.

Sitting behind a computer and researching major health concerns weren’t the only things I did during my time in country. Each weekend, a few interns and I would travel around the country and see as much as we possibly could in 48 hours. I've included a few of my favorite pictures from those trips that give me happiness each time I look at them.

Golden hour mealtime at the end of day one on our safari - Mikumi National Park