1. Develop a M&E plan for your project.

 

Below is a Monitoring and Evaluation Framework layout for Ukweli Test Strips.

	Indicator	Definition	Baseline	Target	Data Source	Frequency	Responsible	Reporting
Goal	Reduction in the maternal mortality rate in Sierra Leone.	The number of maternal deaths reported by the government of Sierra Leone at some point in time during our venture subtracted by the maternal mortality rate .	1,360 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births.	A number hopefully much lower than 1,360 in the long run	Utilize medical data from hospitals/other PHUs and records from Sierra Leone’s Government.	Every other year might be a good frequency but more frequent may work.	World Hope International, our partner on the ground will most likely be measuring and collecting the proper data for this goal.	This statistic will be reported to the Sierra Leone government and other global health programs most likely.
Outcomes	Number of women who are screened and screen positive for UTIs and/or Preeclampsia.	Records kept by community health workers and other clinics regarding how many women were screened and their outcomes compared to the number of screenings prior to this venture (If that information is available).	A current value of amount of women screened for UTIs / Preeclampsia is not available.	The target would be to get as many women at risk for UTI / Preeclampsia in the operating regions screened.	Utilize records made up by Ukweli of how many women are screened.	This data could be collected pretty frequently, probably multiple times a year.	This data would be kept by the health workers administering the tests to pregnant women.	This outcome would be reported to World Hope International, as well as the Ukweli team in the United States. Might be beneficial to be reported to the government.
Output	The mindset of seeking help and being open to communicate  when experiencing symptoms, rather than doing nothing (current problem)	Track how many times women got screened or were referred somewhere else to get screened. Shows initiative to actually do something.	No data available for this.	A noticeable increase in women who come to doctors to get screened / talk about their health in regards to UTI / Pree	Utilize records made up by Ukweli of how many women are screened.	This could be monitored pretty frequently to get an idea of the change in attitude	The health workers who are administering the strips/talking to patients about their symptoms/referring	This output would be reported to World Hope, the Ukweli Team, and possibly different government organizations.

Some of the assumptions used to create this framework included:

• Messaging, communication, and advertising measures are effective and reach enough of the intended audience. If this assumption is carried out, then the goal, output, and outcome will be reached.
• The tests will be accurate in its screening. If they are not accurate, then women who have UTIs/Preeclampsia may not screen positive, which is detrimental to helping women with these problems. If these women are not helped, the maternal mortality would not be lowered as much as it could, and not as many women would seek out this screening.
• The strip is priced appropriately. If the strip is too expensive in the eyes of the women, then the goal and outcome cannot be reached

The logic model that would be in place would look something like this:

 

Inputs	Activities	Outputs	Outcomes	Goal Alignment
-Funding -Partnerships with OEMs, World Hope International -Team of college students/professors	-Delivery of test strips to health clinics/workers in Sierra Leone -Training of health workers on UTIs/Preeclampsia, how to use the strips, how to advertise it to women	-Number of women screened -Number of women that screen positive -Number of women referred to other health clinics to get	-Better health for mother and baby -lowering of the maternal mortality rate and infant mortality rate	-If all falls into place the way Ukweli is intending it to, then the outcomes of the operations would align very well with the goal.

 

 

2) Estimate the Social Return on Investment for your project.

 

For this social return on investment, to see how much money is generated per $1 spent, I am deciding to look at it in terms of $1 spent solely on test strips due to the fact that the strip costs are most traceable and factoring the overhead spent and other costs associated would make this very complicated. Therefore, assuming we produce each test strip for two cents (the current rate), we would multiply the social return for one strip by 50 in order to get it in terms of $1 spent. We would also have to assume the price that a health worker buys a 100 strip box for from World Hope and how much they sell each strip for in order to figure out the profit per strip they would make. We would also have to assume how much a women in Sierra Leone would have to pay for a strip that is currently on the market in order to see how much money they would save purchasing an Ukweli test strip. Assuming a health worker purchases a 100 strip box for $5 ($0.05 per strip) and sells each strip for 2,000 Sierra Leonean Leones ($0.23), they would be making a profit of $0.18 per strip, or $9 if they sold $1 worth of strips (50 strips). According to our crowdfunding video, a single UTI screening test at a clinic costs roughly $2, so assuming that is the actual price, women will save $1.77 buying an Ukweli Test Strip for $0.23 from a community health worker. Therefore, when only considering the money associated with buying and selling test strips, for one test strip Ukweli generates $1.95 of social impact between the health worker administering the strip and the women getting tested. This equates to $97.50 generated for $1 spent solely on test strips. However, since this only focused on the cost to produce strips and not the money spent on overhead, etc, the number calculated for generated money may be higher than it actually is.

 

 

1) Funding sources for dissemination

 

 

Since Ukweli is a few years into the venture, our project is out of the design phase for the most part, and we are more focused towards developing our project currently in the dissemination phase of the project.

1: Crowdfunding: Ukweli Test Strips have been in discussion about pursuing funding for our project through crowdfunding efforts, and have taken the initial steps in order to pursue crowdfunding. The crowdfunding could be conducted through either of the two main crowdfunding sites available, which would be Kickstarter or Indiegogo. Although receiving a large amount of money through a health related venture such as Ukweli might be a little tough through crowdfunding, it definitely is not out of the realm of possibility to acquire. As of now,  Ukweli has laid out a plan for a crowdfunding video, which will include both an animation that depicts the life of a pregnant mother in Sierra Leone who is living with the threat of contracting a UTI or having preeclampsia, and also outlines what our project is, what our team is doing right now, and what the goals of the project are. We have filmed our team members doing the speaking parts of the video, so once the animations and editing have been squared away we will be ready to launch our campaign to the public.

Our partner in Sierra Leone, World Hope International, has agreed to match funding we receive from outside sources up to $6,000, making them a source of funding for us as well. This agreement makes World Hope International a source of funding for Ukweli Test Strips as well, but this source of funding is dependent on us receiving an adequate amount of funding from other sources. This is why we are hoping to acquire a minimum of $6,000 from crowdfunding, in order to receive the full money that World Hope has offered to pay.

2: Saving Lives at Birth: The Saving Lives at Birth grant is a funding source supported by Grand Challenges Canada, USAID, NORAD, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, DFID, and KOICA. This grant calls looks to fund prevention and treatment approaches for pregnant women and newborns in poor and hard to reach communities, which is exactly what the Ukweli Test Strips venture is focused on. As a project that has been in the works for multiple years at this point, Ukweli Test Strips is looking to transition to scale in the near future, which is the type of venture and innovation that Saving Lives at Birth is looking to support. Saving Lives at Birth looks for projects that are affordable, accessible, and sustainable, which is something Ukweli has built their model around, and Saving Lives at Birth also focus on three different areas: science and technology, service delivery, and demand creation. While the physical product Ukweli offers is not a scientific breakthrough, our venture is made special due to the approach it takes on solving the last mile approach of getting the strips to the hard to reach and underserved communities in Sierra Leone, so this venture falls into the service delivery aspect that Saving Lives at Birth focuses on.

 

2) Income statement and assumptions

Pictured here is the Income statement that has been constructed for Ukweli for the first three years after it has officially launched as a venture in Sierra Leone. As you can see, we are expecting large increases in sales each year for the first three years, but all of the costs associated with the venture increase as well, leading to the losses in total income increasing. Although these losses may be concerning, it is not unusual for this to happen to non-profit and social ventures when assessing income just based off of sales.

One of the assumptions that was made in the creation of the income statement for the sales account is that the messaging and advertising for the venture is effective, and awareness of Ukweli and it’s services increases and spreads to other parts of Sierra Leone outside of the Bombali District that the venture is currently focusing on. With awareness of the venture growing, more women will know the importance of getting screened for UTIs and Preeclampsia, which will therefore mean more boxes of strips will be sold, which obviously would create more revenue for our venture. The assumption that the current mindset of doing nothing regarding UTI and Preeclampsia signs and symptoms will change during the time can also tie into the idea of sales increasing. Even if the workers on the ground follow protocol in advertising the strips, if people don’t change their attitude about not doing anything if they experience symptoms that could be related to UTIs and Preeclampsia, then the strips would not sell as well as we would hope.

Some other assumptions we have made that relate to the cost of goods sold account is that the rate we are getting for the test strips will continue to be roughly the same. This would most likely be the case if we continue to work with our current Original Equipment Manufacturer, WangCheng, so that is something we factored in.

We also assume that the overhead for the venture will continue to be high. From what Ukweli has observed, the overhead is very high for the venture, and we did not anticipate for those rates to decrease when the income statement was created.