The US- and Mali-based staff spent two weeks in January together in the field in Mali. Our incredibly limited access to the internet did not allow us to post our blog updates from the field, so we are sharing them now from the zippy wi-fi of the U.S. Join us on the blog for the next few weeks for a daily update on the trip!

By Merritt Frey, Executive Director

Day 3, January 13: Monday in Mali brought our first kind of normal day of the trip. What’s a normal day? Visiting with as many of our schools as we can, listening as much as possible, laughing with our students, and maybe a little dancing.

First stop: Zambougou

We started the day in the “big” town of Ouelessebougou but quickly headed south to Zambougou, where our Denik Middle School is located. There, I met with a huge turnout from the school committee while Hindaty, our Girls Project Coordinator, met with the girls of the school. The school committee discussion ranged from their plans for improving their graduation rate (for example, how about evening classes?) to children’s health concerns (largely malaria). The school has a new principal this year — a former teacher from our school in Mana in about 45 minutes away — and he was very organized and impressive.

Hindaty had the most interesting time though. This is the first year of our Girls Project in Zambougou, and this month’s Girl Group meetings are focused on understanding the menstrual cycle and how to manage it so the girls can attend school. Hindaty delivered menstrual kits — made by our incredible volunteers — to the girls that will help them stay in school for three years.

Next up: Beneko

Next, we headed down a bumpy, red dirt road to the village of Beneko, which is home to our Cliff and Nita Bailey Middle School. This village always greets us with a lot of fun, and this time was no exception. There was music, great dancing, and a lot of fun. After enjoying the celebration for a while, I headed off to meet with the school committee.

We covered a lot of topics in our school committee discussion, but two really stood out. First, probably the happiest I was all day was when a parent announced, “There is no early marriage in the village now due to Mali Rising’s Girl Project.” How’s that for great news!?

The other really fun topic involved our brand-new Mothers’ Loan Fund. We launched this fund with village mothers at the beginning of the school year. We gave the Fund seed money to loan to mothers who wanted to start a small business. The catch? The interest on the loans would be used to pay girls’ school fees. The mothers’ representatives were amazing and told us about their diverse business models — from buying shoes for resale to designing and creating baby wraps with fabric they used their loan funds to buy. In fact, mothers were selling to the crowd on hand for the education celebration as we spoke! The bottom line: the Mothers’ Loan Fund will pay the school fees of ever girl at the school this year!

We love this Fund because it is part of our vision of making the Girls Project sustainable — we can’t pay every girl’s school fees forever, but we can make sure mothers have what they need to keep their girls in school and learning.