Empower girls in Niger for change via education

Some schools help you pass an exam, others get you through life.

In October, the beginning of the new school year for students in Niger, we asked our girl students who receive scholarships from us to continue school, how they felt about coming back to the Amadou Hampaté Bâ Middle School and here's what they had to say!

• I'm looking forward to math. I like numbers. I'm looking forward to lunch as well. I love sharing my condensed milk sandwiches with my friends.
  Amina, 13
• I'm looking forward to recess and making new friends and seeing my old friends. I like science because our teacher is very good and I want to become a botanist.
  Ousseina, 14
• I'm looking forward to changing classes and making new friends. I'm definitely looking forward to meeting my teachers. Teachers here care about us. I'm not looking forward to waking up so early in the morning though.
  Salamatou, 15
• I'm looking forward to French. It's my favorite subject. I'm not looking forward to the English class because it's going to be new and perhaps difficult.
  Nana, 12

Ordinary words from ordinary girl students? No, not really. In Niger, the rate of early marriage is of 77 percent. Without your donations, Amina, Nana, Ousseina and Salamatou would NOT have come back to school. Not being able to afford their school fees, their parents would have most probably married them off. At 14 and 15, they would have been talking about their difficult pregnancies, their babies’ health problems, their relationships with their co-wives, their lack of independence, and their difficult economic situation.

 Thanks to your donations, these girl students won’t be taken out of school once they hit puberty. At the Hampaté Bâ Middle School, Amina, Nana, Ousseina, and Salamatou will not only benefit from an education that will provide them with factual knowledge and technical skills, but they will also learn social skills and develop self-esteem and the confidence needed to access resources and opportunities, and to voice opinions.

 Thanks to your generosity, Les amis de Hampaté Bâ will be able to give girl students more years of schooling which will result in many positive outcomes, including later ages of marriage, lower fertility, and healthier and better educated children.

 If that is not making a difference in someone’s life, what is?