Blog
This fall, Awa L. Toure received an Inspiration Scholarship from the Mali Rising Foundation. These scholarships are designed to help our most outstanding students continue their education and build independent, bright futures for themselves. Awa is already on the road to her dream future at tailor school!
As part of work to help girls get into school and succeed there, Mali Rising Foundation works with boys. Why boys? Because we need them to be allies for the girls in their classrooms and their sisters at home! I lead regular discussion groups with boys in our partner schools to help them think through the benefits of girls’ education and their role in making it possible. Recently, we hosted a boys’ discussion group at Sue Taylor Middle School in Diorilia. Eighty-seven boys at the discussion!
Encouraging and recognizing good work done is an effective way to develop a taste for learning. Indeed, reward is an extrinsic motivator that prompts the student to improve certain behaviors, providing conditions that facilitate their motivation and learning.
It is in this context that the Girls’ Project gave gifts to 15 most outstanding girl students from last school year in the five villages of Girls’ Project -- Zambougou, Sebela, Dorila, Tamala and N'Tentou. This was done both to reward the girls for their hard work and to create competition among all the girls to study hard.
Mr. Luck Kamaté has been teaching at Sue Taylor middle school of Diorila for seven years. He teaches French, history, geography and English. In addition to all of these subjects, he also serves as the school principal. Because of a teacher shortage in Mali, all too often our hard-working teachers also have to serve the administrative role of principal – that makes for a lot of work!
In most rural villages in Mali, women play a fairly important role in taking charge of children's school fees. But to save money, many men prefer to enroll only boys in school and prefer girls stay at home with their mother. Yet who pays the students' tuition fees? In the majority of our schools, women pay school fees. To raise funds for the fees, women may cut firewood, pick shea nuts to make shea butter, grow vegetables in gardens to sell at the market, or grow. These hard-working mothers can do amazing things for thier kids…with just a tiny bit of help!
Students who receive Mali Rising Inspiration Scholarships tell many stories about the impact on their lives. From 2016 until today, more than 50 girls and boys have been able to study thanks to these scholarships.
After 9th grade in Mali, the government chooses the course of study for most students, including our graduates. However, the government does not ever direct any student with to a health school such as a nursing program directly after 9th grade, although these schools privately admit students at this level. According to our students who study in the field of health, only students sponsored by Mali Rising’s Inspiration Scholarships have the chance to continue their studies in health after graduating middle school.
By Merritt Frey, Executive Director
I am not sporty. Like, not at all sporty. But when we researched critical components for our Girls Project it was clear that sport should be part of the project. Studies show team sports can help recruit more girls into schools and that participating on a team helps keep girls enrolled — reducing drop outs. Even though I know know the studies provide good, quantitative facts, nothing beats a story to drive the point home! I recently asked Hindaty, our Girls Project Coordinator, if she had a story from one of our soccer playing girls and she shared this one:
“Hawa Touré is 14 years old and is doing 8th grade at Sue Taylor Middle School. She is a very intelligent girl. She and her mother were abandoned by her father, so she had a very hard childhood. This year she and her mother had decided that she would drop out of school to start a small business to meet their needs. She did not come to school regularly, but did come regularly to the Girls Group meetings. One day, the girls of Simidji [another Mali Rising Girls Project village] came to play against the girls in Diorila. She absolutely wanted to play but I told her no unless she attended school regularly. Hawa accepted my proposal so I let her play. After this match, she began to take an interest in studies because she wanted at all costs to play the return match in Simidji. She had an average grade of 14. Hawa is brave now to continue studying thanks to soccer. “
I love this story, and hope you do too! Our supporters make turnarounds like Hawa’s possible for Mali Rising students. Thank you for your help! Learn more about the Girls Project.
Oh that question! What do you want to be when you grow up? Every kid has fielded this question dozens of times, right? (For me: Olympic equestrian team member, veterinarian.) But it is an interesting question when we are investing in education as a tool to allow people to build the lives they want…what lives do they actually want to build? As part of the year end evaluation of the Girls Project, we asked our girls just that.
The choices we make for ourselves and for others can have a big impact on our lives. We need to know the choices to make so that we and our loved ones stay healthy and safe. Often in our small villages in Mali we don't think much about these choices. But by learning from each other, we can see the many ways we can help each other and what we can do to improve our health and lifestyle.
Day 7 of traveling was a very full Friday indeed. In the morning, we visited the Sue Taylor Middle School of Diorila, which is about one and a half hours down a bumpy dirt road. We returned to Ouelessebougou for lunch and a trip to the big Friday market, before zipping down the road to visit our Sue Chung Chiu Middle School in Simidiji.
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