They say first impressions matter. If that’s true, we really started things off right with our first meeting of the new school year for the Girls’ Project! All the girls in the Project’s five new villages (Diorlia, Sankama, Mana, Nieguenkoro, and Manabougou) enjoyed our first Girls’ Group meetings immensely.
Charging Up Principals for a New School Year
As the new school year got underway in Mali this month, we started gathering groups of our partner schools’ principals together to share ideas and energy. The first such meeting was hosted in the Ouelessebougou area, which is home to the majority of partner villages. It was an energetic meeting and the principals really took ownership of how to help each other in the coming year.
Alumni Networks for Mali Rising Schools
One key issue in any international development project is sustainability — how do you make sure a project is something a local community wants and is willing and able to support. Over the last 16 years of our work, the partner villages we work with have really driven our work and kept every school we’ve built with them functioning. But there is always room for improvement, and that’s where the new Alumni Networks come in!
Turning a Sewing Machine Into a Bright Future
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!
Meet the Principal of our Newest School!
A New School for Mali!
Escaping from Early Marriage Thanks to a Scholarship
Keeping Schools Safe for Learning
Building and opening a new school is a joyful occasion that everyone celebrates. Less exciting but every bit as important is maintaining the school – maintenance keeps schools safe for our students as the learn and grow. Generally speaking, once Mali Rising builds a school we turn over ownership – and responsibility for care – to the village. The School Management Committee is made up of village leaders and parents and they are charged with maintaining the school. However, occasionally problems occur that are too large and expensive for the village to tackle alone. As part of our partnership, Mali Rising then works with the village to solve the problems together.
A Long, Long Walk to School
Today, October 5, is National Walk to School Day here in the United States, which is great. But for kids in Mali, every day is walk to school day. While here in the US walking to school is rightly encouraged as a good thing, in Mali it can be a huge problem. In fact, the distance kids face on that walk is often the most powerful factor driving them to drop out of school.
