After a Year of Volunteering, The Assistant to the International Communications Team Bids Farewell to her Tostan Family

Story by Sydney Skov, Tostan Volunteer in Dakar, Senegal

Directing a summer camp for kids at my local tennis club was a perfect, post-college career with a short life expectancy and excellent swimming pool perks, but I had my sights set on something more than arts and crafts afternoons. Driven by a passion for adventure and a desire to continue my studies of French and African relations outside the classroom, I searched single-mindedly for a way to live in Senegal. With deferred student loans and a non-existent budget, most programs I found seemed impossibly expensive. My high-top All-Stars were worn through at the heels and I had learned to live entirely off of instant oatmeal. Time and effort were what I had to give. 

Enter a little bit of luck and a good Google search. Tostan. The volunteer positions were exactly what I had been looking for: based in Senegal, lasting six months to a year, and focused on professional work with an NGO working to promote causes I believe in: human rights and education. I booked my flight.

I arrived at 6 am. As I began to sweat I thought how strange it was that I’d been standing in snow only hours before. The beads on my forehead were a subtle yet effective display of my new arrival status; men at the airport were wearing parkas, cold in the balmy January winter. The sun rose over the sandy roads and the raw brick buildings; after a quick taxi ride, I was home. I threw my jeans in the back of the closet in the Tostan volunteer house, donned a floor length skirt instead, and greeted a girl in red-striped p-js with blond hair and tired eyelids who was just getting up: my roommate for the next seven months. Exhausted from a month-long monitoring mission to The Gambia, Katie said nothing but, “Do you want to go to church?” Her invitation— to a local Christian church in a predominately Muslim country – sparked my curiosity. As the call to prayer sounded from the neighborhood mosque, I headed downtown to a gospel church. From the windows of the black and yellow taxi I caught my first true glimpses of the fascinating and diverse undercurrents of my new life in Senegal.  

Although I extended my stay with Tostan from six months to a year, I’m still not ready to go. Dakar has become a second home thanks to the warm welcome of Tostan staff and older volunteers who taught me how to greet a room with Wolof hellos and handshakes, how to bargain with a taxi driver, how to share lunch around a big silver bowl without making everyone else uncomfortable, how to exist in respectful harmony with a culture that is not my own. My dedication to human rights education continues to strengthen as I see proof of positive social transformation stemming from grassroots development. I have seen hundreds of communities stand up to publicly declare abandonment of harmful practices like female genital cutting and child/forced marriage. I have been lucky enough to be a part, however tiny, of Tostan and this history-making movement.

I have also been lucky enough to weave myself into this city’s vibrant fabric, to meet and mingle with inspired Dakar dancers who have, for me—a long-time contemporary dancer—re-defined what it means to be an artist.

My experiences of dance in Dakar have included many classes, rehearsals, performances, and workshops. And the more I learn, the more I give in to rhythms and steps my legs and feet find unfamiliar, the more I understand how everything is connected—how dance is in everything, in the steps of wrestlers by the water, in the rhythmic pounding of spices with a mortar and pestle, in the celebration of women as their villages abandon ancient, harmful traditions, in the melodic lilt of Wolof phrases that remind us that we are all together. Volunteering with Tostan and my experiences in Senegal have given me more than I could have hoped; they have shown me how we are all connected in our work, in the help that we offer each other, in the belief that we all have the right and the capacity to live better lives if we just have the courage to open ourselves up to something new. We can all change ourselves for the better. I can only thank my family at Tostan, and my extended family and friends in Senegal, for helping me to see this incredible truth as it develops in communities across West Africa, and within me.     

Discussing Community Empowerment in Koulikoro, Mali

Story by Claire Constant, Tostan Volunteer in Bamako, Mali

Tostan’s National Coordinator in Mali, his assistant, and I, the Tostan volunteer based in Bamako, Mali, visited the region of Koulikoro, some 60 kilometers from Bamako. The goal of our mission was to assist in the intervillage meetings, or RIVs, which bring together the rural communities of Dienandougou and Méguétan in the area of Koulikoro, a region in which Tostan has implemented the Community Empowerment Program (CEP).

Once in Koulikoro, we arrived at the Niger River and continued our journey across to Kénandou, the main village of Dienandougou, where the welcome we received from the community was truly remarkable. In the presence of the Mayor, health workers, and representatives from the Office of Radio and Television in Mali, CEP participants came in droves, excited by the news that the CEP would soon begin again.  

We were also welcomed by the Mayor himself. Village representatives and many CEP coordinators responded to the call for a meeting, demonstrating the strength of the communities’ commitment to the Tostan program.    

The object of the meeting was to share with the villages the essential points of the remainder of Tostan’s 30-month education program, which is based on a respect for human rights. The audience enthusiastically welcomed the news that facilitators ─ individuals from the region trained by Tostan to lead CEP classes ─ would soon be back to begin the second phase of the program: the Kobi 2. This module of the Tostan program, which deals primarily with the subjects of health and hygiene, follows the Kobi 1, a module focused on democracy and human rights.

Having paused for the rainy season, everyone gathered affirmed that they were eager to begin the next phase of the Tostan program in order to gain more  knowledge and skills. The community empowerment movement continues.


Photos by Claire Constant

From Bamako to Kolda: 54 Malian Representatives Take Part in the Public Declaration in Kolda, Senegal

Story by Claire Constant, Tostan Volunteer in Bamako, Mali

On the 28th of November, a very special event happened in Kolda, Senegal. Representatives from over 700 villages of this southern region of the country gathered to publicly declare their commitment to abandon harmful practices such as female genital cutting (FGC) and child/forced marriage.

As a volunteer in Tostan’s Bamako office, I accompanied representatives from the Malian government and from Tostan partner NGOs, as well as religious leaders, Community Management Committee (CMC) coordinators, and community members on the long journey to Kolda.

Tostan's National Coordinator in Mali, Abou Amel Camara, his Assistant, Dieynaba Diallo Diop, and I traveled to villages in Mali where Tostan implements the Community Empowerment Program (CEP) to inform participants that they had been invited by their Senegalese neighbors to attend the declaration. The communities democratically chose representatives for the trip to Senegal.

At the declaration, seeing new dances and hearing different rhythms and songs was a highlight for the Malian participants. Oumou Coulibaly, one of Tostan’s facilitators in the Koulikoro area who had never visited the southern region of Senegal, was particularly happy to discover a different culture and be able to see such lively and joyful performances. “We were all very happy to meet with new people, to discover traditional dances that we had never seen before. Overall, being able to talk to people from different cultures, and to march with them here in Kolda as a family, made us all very happy,” she said.

The public reading of the declaration in three languages─French, Pulaar and Mandika—was a moving moment. “I was particularly impressed by the content of the declaration itself,” said Dieynaba Traoré, a participant from Sendo, Mali, a village in the Koulikoro area where Tostan works. “It was probably the most remarkable moment for me, and I will remember it for a long time.”

On the way back to Mali, despite fatigue, everyone reflected on the busy weekend. As their communities’ chosen representatives, the members of the Malian delegation now have the important responsibility to share their experience with their friends and families. This is a task that they take seriously. “Now that I have attended this declaration, I believe that one day, Malian communities will do the same,” stated Minata Diarra from the village of Fégoun. “It is so very important that I share what I saw with people from my community,” she said.

Photos by Claire Constant: Top- the delegation from Mali marches to the public declaration. Middle- Tostan's National Coordinator in Mali tells CEP participants they have been invited to the grand event. Below- members of the Malian delegation at the declaration.

The village of Tankanto Mauondé, Senegal: A Village of Activists

Story by Caitlin Snyder, Tostan Volunteer in Kolda, Senegal

Rich in tradition, the village of Tankanto Mauondé prides itself on a history that spans over 400 years. These villagers speak with even more pride, however, when they discuss the future of their daughters. The next generation of girls will grow up in a community which has declared to abandon female genital cutting (FGC) and child/forced marriage.

Takanto Mauondé was once a community of Fulani farmers who cultivated rice, maize, and peanuts, crops which once constituted the main source of revenue for the original 700 inhabitants. Today, the most important value in the village is that of teranga, or Senegalese hospitality. A strong interest in the well being of others is reflected in the character of the villagers and it is this interest that influenced their participation in the Tostan program. After Tostan began implementing the Community Empowerment Program (CEP) in the community in 2008, the 76 participants – 66 women and eight adolescents – responded enthusiastically to the lessons on health and human rights. Women created a Community Management Committee (CMC), a group of 17 democratically elected individuals, and initiated awareness-raising campaigns to introduce nearby villages to the negative effects of harmful traditional practices. 

Boubakry Baldé, the husband of a CMC member, described the committee’s work: “We have seen many changes in mentality in the village and there is now greater potential for the development of young girls.” Today, the villagers speak about the importance of sending children to school, and they proudly insist that no girl will be forced to quit school due to an early marriage.

“It’s the women who took the initiative,” said the village chief’s representative. Today, women have a more central role in the village. “Before, women didn’t speak during meetings,” recalled Fatoumata Baldé, the coordinator of the CMC. “Now, even during baptism ceremonies, marriage celebrations, and religious events, women are involved in the decisions.” 

The changes brought about by the CMC are extraordinary. The CMC initiated a dialogue on the importance of birth registration as well as registering children for school. Women have won respect and now have the full support of everyone in Tankanto Mauondé, from the village chief to religious leaders.

Thanks to knowledge gained in the areas of mathematics and project management during the Tostan program, the CMC leads income generating activities such as selling vegetables and dried fish. Entrepreneurs meet two times a month to calculate their expenses and the benefits of their sales. They speak with enthusiasm regarding projects they will begin in the coming year.

The community’s decision to abandon harmful traditional practices ─ which they shared with the world in a grand declaration held on November 28th ─ shows a strong wish to preserve the health and the rights of their daughters. According to Mamoudou Baldé, “We will show the government, neighboring communities, and other countries that we have decided to abandon FGC and child/forced marriage.” On the 28th of November, the village of Tankanto Mauondé was one of 700 villages investing in the future of every girl in Senegal. 

Photos by Caitlin Snyder