My daughter, Rowan has big plans for this year’s trip to Senegal. Last year she planned for and helped establish a new communications position for Maison de la Gare, a local Senegalese to take over some of the communications work we, and in particular my Dad, do from Canada. How would she top that this year?
Rowan studied international development in university, developing many ideas herself about what NOT to do. During her degree she had extensively researched and written about the talibé system in Senegal, its causes, and levers, and possible solutions. She has also been here fourteen times before, and had visited the bush region of M’Baye Aw in the desert twice. She had a theory. Education should help change social norms and diminish modern forms of slavery - for girls as well as boys, for some interesting reasons.
The remote villages had few or no schools. Young boys were often sent to the city to be talibés, and they rarely returned, emptying the villages of much male youth. For many families the prospect of learning the Quran in a daara was the only educational opportunity their boys would have. The girls married polygamously and young. Forced marriage at the age of twelve is common in these villages. It had a certain sad logic. No young boys, way more remaining females than males, poverty, no schools for the girls anyways, and the begging daaras are only for boys…
We have been involved for some time with a project of helping build and reinforce schools and financing teachers in several remote village schools. This was the idea and project of a friend of ours from the area, and we supported his dream for his region over the years, and linked the project with Maison de la Gare. Amazing things began to happen after the first school was built. Parents stopped sending their boys to the city to be talibés. Girls started to attend school too. Talibés in the city from the region were identified, rescued and returned home. After many years of this schools project there are now over 560 students, almost half are girls. And, no more talibés from these particular villages that have access to schools! Although classes in the villages end at age fourteen, some intrepid students who want to continue their studies into high school move to town, about three hours drive away, and billet with relatives. Some girls even, despite the unimaginable challenges they face, have extended their studies in this way. Once a passion for learning is lit, it burns.
Last year when I visited the region with Rowan and also my son Robbie, something new appeared to be happening. When meeting the students from the villages that had travelled to the nearest town, Dahra Diollof to write government year end exams, we were met multiple young girls who were being pressured to marry. The age seemed to be increasing, though. Previously it had been age twelve, and now it they told us age fourteen was becoming more typical. But social norms take time to change. The reasons that caused this problem may no longer be in place. But customs and tradition remain. Some girls told us they would soon be forced to marry by their parents. They begged for our help because they wanted to continue to study and not marry.
And so, we are establishing a “full ride” scholarship, Bourse Suxali: For Women at the Heart of Development of their Communities. We have set it up through the Canadian charitable foundation, C.F. Johnston. The first Bourse Suxali offered is for the 2023-2024 academic year. For a girl in her final year of high school. A girl from the M’Baye Aw villages region. On condition she receives her high school diploma. To study post secondary health sciences of some kind (the idea of our friend, physiotherapist Vicki Chase who travelled with us). For up to three years- the time required to earn health credentials. Preference for an unmarried girl. For someone who wants to then return to help her village continue to develop and improve, and provide an example to other girls, and boys also, that education leads to better things not just for oneself, but for the community as a whole.
During this week’s trip to the villages, Rowan, Vicki and I met the president of a Dahra Diollof high school where five of the eleven girls from the region in their final year are currently studying. And we met with the girls themselves to ask about their hopes and dreams, to deliver the scholarship information and inform them of next steps. Two want to be lawyers, one an architect or geographer, one wants to join the army, and another dreams of health care. We also met one girl in Saint Louis who had run away from her village to pursue her education. She is in her final year and is an eligible candidate for Suxali. She wants to become a nurse. The president of the high school will take responsibility for informing the other five eligible girls from the other schools, as well as those now two and three years away from graduation, so they will be inspired to work harder and also spread the word, should this first scholarship and funding go well and we can offer more.
Our friend Cheikh, the president of the village schools association, l’Association pour la rétention des enfants en village et la diminution du mariage précoce, is certain the existence of Bourse Suxali will incentivize more parents to allow, even encourage their daughters to continue to study into high school and help relieve the pressure of forced early marriage. Rowan planned and is leading the execution of this scholarship. Vicki helped us define and refine it. We have funded the first year of Bourse Suxali, and there is time enough to fund the rest. It is Rowan’s and our great hope that we can fundraise sufficiently to enable a new Bourse Suxali to be offered every academic year to a new graduating student. And we would love to eventually offer a scholarship for boys as well, as they face terrible, albeit different challenges. Education is saving them from the fate of being forced begging talibés, and offering hope. Pas a pas, s’avance. Education changes everything.
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