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In cooperation with:
Toilets Making the Grade® –
Towards Safe Sanitation
and Hygiene in Schools
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Dear Students, Parents, Teachers, Colleagues and Friends,
As patron of the “Toilets Making the Grade” school competitions, I would like to thank
all participants and the organisers for their commitment to this important issue!
Clean toilets and good hygiene are at the heart of a safe learning environment.
Whether you are old or young, rich or poor – everyone needs to use a toilet. It is a
human right to have access to safe sanitation!
Nonetheless, more than 600 million children worldwide still do not have basic sanita-
tion at their schools and it is my sincere wish that we overcome this challenge fast!
“Toilets Making the Grade” is an excellent approach, as it empowers students and
teachers to talk about and analyse their own situation – developing their own crea-
tive improvements.
The competitions were a big success story in 2019 – with more than 70,000 partici-
pants in Uganda and Pakistan. This time, it is our goal to think even bigger and
achieve even more.
Germany intends to provide ongoing support to this idea and will increase the
budget for the school competitions in the future. With continued success, we hope
to make this concept available to more countries through further partners.
I wish everyone involved in “Toilets Making the Grade” good luck and great success!
May the very best ideas be brought to light - in a competition where all participants
are winners!
Dr. Maria Flachsbarth – Patron of TMG in Germany
Parliamentary State Secretary to the Federal Minister
for Economic Cooperation and Development (retired)
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Dear Students, Parents, Teachers, Colleagues and Friends,
It is a great pleasure to support the “Toilets Making the Grade” school competition in
our schools. I am extremely excited about the uniqueness of this competition which
addresses all people at school and brings them together to work on solutions for
challenges related to water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH).
With better cleanliness and safe hygiene in our schools, we will learn in a healthier
environment which enables us to perform better! There is a direct inter-connection
between school attendance, health, clean school toilets and proper handwashing.
Therefore, it is so crucial to improve the sanitation and hygiene situation in our
schools.
I was so thrilled about the first TMG school competition in Uganda, that took place in
Kampala in 2018/19 under the leadership of the Kampala Capital City Authority. It
was a great success and a memorable event.
The same competition has been acknowledged by the Ministry of Education and
Sports for countrywide up-scaling, in partnership with the GIZ programme Sanita-
tion for Millions and the German Toilet Organization.
As your participation is the driver of success, I wish you good ideas and a lot of joy
during the development of your proposals and look forward to seeing the creativity,
innovativeness and team-work in your schools.
For God and My Country!
Dr. Cleophus Mugenyi – Patron of TMG in Uganda
Commissioner Basic Education – Ministry of Education and Sports
Toilets Making the Grade® (TMG) is a methodology which incentivizes school
actors to improve their school’s sanitation with minimal external input.
As a school competition, it triggers teamwork between management,
admin istration, parents, pupils and maintenance staff. The teams receive
an inspirational packet with methods to self-analyse their school sanitation
challenges and develop own solutions. The school with the best ideas and
effective improvements wins the competition.
Many of these solutions target operation and maintenance of school WASH
facilities, like blocked toilet pipes or provision of soap and a coherent
concept including funding of activities.
Ideally the competition is run by the government, which benefits from a new
perspective of school WASH through the preparation and judging process.
The methodology was developed by the German Toilet Organization (GTO) for
Germany and adapted to different contexts. TMG was piloted in Uganda and
Pakistan in collaboration with Sanitation for Millions (GIZ), a global programme
aiming at the improvement of access to safe sanitation and hygiene especially
for vulnerable groups.
Toilets Making the Grade® –
A Competition where all
Participants are Winners
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Fostering common awareness for the importance of sanitation
and hygiene with all school stakeholders and the public
Facilitating self-assessments of schools concerning their sanitation
and hygiene situation
Motivating self-improvements for making school toilets a more pleasant place
Contributing to a better learning environment
Protecting infrastructure investments through better use and maintenance,
easing the financial burden on local authorities
Improving the local authorities’ ability for WASH related
inter-departmental inspections
A creative and playful way
to safe sanitation and hygiene
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Published by
Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale
Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH
Registered offices
Bonn and Eschborn
Postfach 5180
65726 Eschborn / Germany
Sanitation for Millions
Dr. Bärbel Schwaiger
T +49 6196 79-2809
I www.giz.de/en/worldwide/42666.html
In cooperation with:
German Toilet Organization e. V.
Juliusstraße 41
12051 Berlin
T +49 30 419343-45
E post@germantoilet.org
On behalf of
German Federal Ministry for
Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)
Division 103 Water, sanitation, hygiene
Postal address of BMZ offices
BMZ Bonn
Dahlmannstraße 4
53113 Bonn
Germany
T +49 228 995 35-0
F +49 228 995 35-3500
BMZ Berlin
Stresemannstraße 94
10963 Berlin
Germany
T +49 30 18535-0
F +49 30 18535-2501
E [email protected].de
I www.bmz.de
Authors
Sanitation for Millions and
German Toilet Organization
Design
© by creativ republic / Germany
Photos
© GIZ/ BRSP/ Vanessa Mugide
As at
November 2021
GIZ is responsible for the content of this
publication.
This publication contains links to external
websites. Responsibility for the content of
the listed external sites always lies with their
respective publishers. When the links to these
sites were first posted, GIZ checked the third-
party content to establish whether it could give
rise to civil or criminal liability.
However, the constant review of the links to
external sites cannot reasonably be expected
without concrete indication of a violation of
rights. If GIZ itself becomes aware or is notified
by a third party that an external site it has
provided a link to gives rise to civil or criminal
liability, it will remove the link to this site
immediately. GIZ expressly dissociates itself
from such content.
Funded by Implemented by
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Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale
Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH
Postfach 5180
65726 Eschborn / Germany
Sanitation for Millions
Dr. Bärbel Schwaiger
T +49 6196 79-2809
www.giz.de/en/worldwide/42666.html
In cooperation with:
German Toilet Organization e. V.
Juliusstraße 41
12051 Berlin
T +49 30 419343-45
E post@germantoilet.org
www.toilets-making-the-grade.org
