The issue of alumni engagement is one that every alumni association in the YES family is constantly trying to overcome. In recent years, The Zanzibar YES Alumni Association (ZAYAA) has witnessed a decrease in alumni participation particularly among newer cohorts. Although some of this can be justified -- upon return new alumni have a national exam to take for which they need to study hard for and older alumni have less and less time as they start their careers and families. The alumni association thought a great way to motivate and re-engage alumni would be by planning a nursery school renovation project. Nursery school renovation projects are fun, rewarding and are very much liked among alumni. 

Alumni selected the Chumbuni Nursery School in Zanzibar for their renovation project. Similar to a number of nursery schools on the island, Chumbuni Nursery School is the result of a grassroot effort by community members to have a local school for their children. As such, the nursery is funded by community members and teachers are volunteers. Because these types of nursery schools rely on community contributions, they often lack infrastructures and the fun and colorful attributes that make a nursery school a fun and exciting place for children. 

Three alumni and the twenty recently selected YES students participated in the renovation project. The alumni and students divided into groups and painted different areas to get the job done faster. The alumni particularly enjoy these projects because they directly help make the pupils’ learning environment lighter and more fun.  

Nabil Mohamed Mussa expressed that the alumni would like to go back to the nursery school again sometime and help with various other projects. Some of the projects include fixing the toilets, build a playground for the children and create some landscaping at the school for environmental purposes. The alumni would also like to provide some studying materials for the students such as books, counting objects, charts and other studying materials. 

Since the new YES students hadn’t done a community service project with YES yet,  at first they didn't understand the goals of the project which was volunteering for the sake of communities. But the alumni said that after they explained the responsibilities to them, they had fun doing the project and their feedback was great. The 2019-2020 students also expressed that they would want to do more activities in the future. Mussa believes that activities like this will boost the morale of the students by preparing them before they leave for their exchange year to understand the importance of community service projects.

The Tanzania alumni would also like to continue helping their community in the future with more projects and attracting  community members to join them in their upcoming volunteering activities. Some of these projects include providing education about sexual assault within families, building a stronger relationship with other organizations to work with ZAYAA and fundraising activities to grow ZAYAA. They are also hoping to build the interest of community service in younger alumni and incoming YES students in order to create more alumni who are willing to volunteer for community services after their exchange years. Overall, ZAYAA is looking forward to conduct more activities like this to create a better society through volunteering and fulfilling the aim of the YES program.