Girls' Leadership Day Djilor Style

This past Monday, the Peace Corps Cross Culture and Homestay Coordinator Awa Traore (with whom I work with whenever I am in Thies) came to talk with selected girls from the middle schools in Djilor and Sadioga where I work. In total, 30 girls were chosen by their teachers to participate: 20 from Djilor (a school with about 1,000 students between the middle and high schools) and 10 from Sadioga (middle school student enrollment around 400), based on their academic achievements, motivation, and ability to serve as leaders among their classmates.



The overall theme of the day was focused at keeping girls in school, which was done through conversations about self-confidence, friendship, and knowing oneself, as well as discussing the problems of rape, early/forced marriage, and early/unwanted pregnancy, and how they impact girls in the community.



It was a great day and Awa really got the girls thinking, talking, and sharing. I think the selected faculty members on hand also learned a lot, especially about the problems facing female students today. One faculty member in particular from Djilor was surprised to discover that rape is a big issue among middle school students in the area. Conversations on these sensitive topics got both the girls and faculty members talking and I hope that the greater community will in turn benefit from the day.



Hopefully Monday will be the first in a series of trainings specifically aimed at keeping girls in school through improved leadership, greater self-confidence, reduced rate of unwanted pregnancy, and improved access to education. The next training will hopefully be a several day reproductive health training for students and teachers to lead classes at their respective schools in January, A feelanga Roog.

Your friendly local Peace Corps team: Chris (Moustapha), Me (Khady), Awa, Jessica (a fellow Kaolack Region PCV who organized the tourney), and Mamadou the chauffer.

More pictures and a video (in Wolof, sorry!) are available at http://picasaweb.google.com/pcbeth