Be Inspired

Some TEMBO sponsored girls who attended TEC - TEMBO English Camp - in 2010.

Dear TEMBO Trust Secondary School Sponsored Girls -

I know many of you in places like Longido may not be aware that the Olympics are taking place in London right now due to a lack of electricity or TV. The athletes are doing some pretty amazing things and I wanted to share one of them with you today. It's about a 16 year old girl named Gabby Douglas.

Gabby's story is printed here in the New York Times. The important thing I want you to know is that this very young athlete has become the first African American woman to win an Olympic Gold Medal in Gymnastics. This was no small accomplishment and Gabby had to make many sacrifices to reach her goal. Most of all, she had to gain confidence and to believe in herself. She told herself during the competition, "Believe, don't fear, believe."

16 year old, Gabby Douglas: "Believe, don't fear, believe."

Gabby knows she is now an inspiration to so many young girls all over the world and I wanted you to be some of those girls. You may not want to be a gymnast, and you have dreams and goals of your own. The message here is simply BELIEVE IN YOURSELF and have confidence that you can overcome whatever obstacles you find on the path between you and your goal. For you this might be just staying in school, or saying 'no' to marrying young and having a child. Keep your focus on your goal to finish Secondary School, then take the next step to learn something after Secondary School. Then, the next step will be clear. You can do it.

Good luck as you continue Term II studies at different schools in Longido District. I will end with another question I found today - I think it's a good one, not just for you, but for people of all ages.

The Power of Mary's Passion

A child-mother in Longido.

I woke up this morning with the image of a very small Maasai girl in mind. She could have been any one of hundreds of young girls in Longido or Kimokouwa. And she could have been in high school because traditionally raised Maasai girls can be very small in stature. While there are many factors that contribute to the size of children, one is the practice of FGM or Female Genital Mutilation.

FGM is a cultural practice performed all over Africa, not just in the TEMBO project area. It is considered to be a right of passage for girls, just as male circumcision is for boys. Education will and is changing the frequency of this harmful ritual being performed on girls before marriage. It is another of the many benefits of formal education in Tanzania: so long as a girl is attending school, early marriage will be delayed and so will activities surrounding child marriages including FGM and early pregnancy.

Penina chose education and no FGM for Naana, her daughter.

I have sat in dark smoky huts with very young girls and women, holding newborn babies that were so tiny and struggling to survive. I know a woman who had twins and was so physically small herself that she could not care for both babies. She made a choice to keep one and gave the other baby away. Babies are born tiny and malnourished because mothers severely restrict the amount of food they eat during pregnancy. This is to limit the extreme pain they will experience delivering their babies as a result of FGM. It is one of the terrible consequences that will linger for a lifetime.

Mary works for change from within the community.

Mary Laiser, TEMBO Education Coordinator and Community Facilitator, has come full circle from being a Maasai woman who believed circumcision was a woman's right to being one of the staunchest advocates against FGM. Mary speaks openly about being circumcised herself. She also made it very publicly known that her own daughter, Happiness, would never experience FGM. Happiness would, and did, have an open ceremony attended by dozens of villagers, including public officials. It was a beautiful ritual filled with meaning, but there was no cutting. Since that day five years ago Mary has facilitated the same ritual for other families so that the right of passage is preserved and so is the health and safety of the girl. Slowly, attitudes are changing.

Women like Mary are important change agents in the community. Mary is trusted by the Maasai community because she is part of it. Her voice and her experience matters. I have said before that the modern world is at the door step of the Maasai. If their culture and traditions are to survive the Maasai must adapt. They do not have the luxury of time and the slow progression through stages that other peoples experienced before the spread of technology. Decisions need to be made now that will determine if there will even be a Maasai culture in the future.

It would be a terrible mistake to conclude that because of harmful practices like FGM the Maasai are "backward" and should be forced to abandon their traditions and assimilated into a western system of values and behaviours. For there is so much more, so much richness that would be an even greater loss if the Maasai culture ceased to exist. I am thinking about things like a deep connection to the land and a respect for the elders in the community - things that our western culture so often loses touch with in its race toward industrial superiority and individuality.

Primary school girls learn from Mary that their voice must be heard.

Improving the Odds for Success Through Enriched Education Opportunities Like TEC

You might be able to imagine that getting an education in Tanzania could be a challenge. If you are a girl and if your family has little income, the challenge increases. If you belong to the Maasai tribe, it increases yet again. If you live in a rural area, triple the challenge. As a Canadian-born and educated woman, I can say that those of us living in this part of the world really have no idea what girls and women in Africa go through daily to realize their dreams of being educated.

Education opportunities have changed greatly for these three generations - mother, daughter, grandmother.

Developing countries are doing what the name says - developing. When I visit Tanzania it feels like systems and structures are about 50 years behind what we enjoy in the western world. There are many examples but I am thinking of things like health care, transportation and roads, and education. We can "see" inside so much of the world today thanks to wonders like the internet and smart phones and cable television. Watching news coverage of stories in places like Africa do you sometimes find yourself asking, how can people live like that? or why don't they change? or what's wrong with them?

Well, there is nothing wrong with Africans. They are developing and changing just as other countries have. They are facing enormous challenges and can use all the help they can get from those of us who have progressed through the development phases before them.

These girls thrive when given the opportunities for enriched education Canadian girls have. 

Receiving education is crucial to development and, while any education has the potential to open future possibilities for us, good quality education that provides both learning and confidence makes the greatest difference. Looking at the report cards of many students in Tanzania, some might be prompted to ask, what's wrong with these students? or why aren't they succeeding? We might falsely conclude that Tanzanians are not as smart as we are. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

The girls TEMBO sponsors are just like Canadian girls in secondary school. Except for a few differences: they live in rural villages in a country that is still developing, including the education system and teacher preparation; most of their families are economically very poor and secondary school is not free; they belong to the Maasai tribe where formal education has not been part of the culture and, if a family can send a child to school it is usually a boy; there are very few syllabus books for students to share; and all subjects taught in secondary school are taught in English - a third language the students have had very little exposure to - after speaking the Maa language at home and Swahili in primary school. I could go on about the hurdles Tanzanian girls have to face but I think you get the picture.

Mary Laiser does all the on the ground preparations in Tanzania for TEC.

Four years ago I was having a conversation during a project visit with Mary Laiser, one of the TEMBO staff  very involved in the education program. We were concerned about the failing grades of many of the girls and wanted to do something to help them succeed. We decided to offer the girls a chance to receive tutoring during their one month break in June. Mary made arrangements for the girls to be accommodated in Longido and be instructed by one of the teachers. The first week went well then the girls began skipping classes and failing the tests. We ended the program after the second week. The program was not what they needed and too much like what they got during the school year. The girls went back to school after the break and little changed.

I talked with Marian Roks, one of the TEMBO co-founders, and a life long teacher. I knew Marian had coordinated summer camps for many years for deaf students in Ottawa. These camps were both rich learning opportunities and enjoyable experiences her students looked forward to each year. Could something like this ever work in Tanzania? Why not, we concluded, since students are the same everywhere.

Marian Roks and some of the girls dressed in orange to celebrate
the Netherlands success in the 2010 Fifa  World Cup.

You need to know about TEC - the TEMBO English Camp - developed by Marian and Virginia Taylor. Virginia is on the Project TEMBO Board of Directors in Canada and she is also an instructor in the ESL Teacher Training Program at Carleton University in Ottawa. TEC takes place for three weeks in June, half a world away, and I am sure that, if you listen closely, you can hear and feel the joy it exudes right across the Atlantic Ocean. It's a program delivered entirely in English that we believe is really making a difference for the girls TEMBO sponsors. It's part formal instruction shaped around the girls' school curriculum; part informal instruction through activities like the camera club, or cooking, or sports and games; and a whole lot of fun that takes place through interactions and conversations with Marian, Virginia, and the growing number of Canadian volunteers taking part in TEC.

Virginia Taylor with two of the proud TEC graduates in 2010, the inaugural year.

Recently, Marian, Virginia, and I met for coffee at Bridgehead Coffee House in Ottawa to talk about the June 2012 TEC program. The lesson planning has been well under way for a number of weeks with Canadian teachers and volunteers both in university and older. We talked about exciting new ideas to incorporate into the evolving TEC program, including important suggestions from Mary and Paulina in Tanzania. This year student teachers from Mt Meru University and in Teacher Training programs will be involved. It's part of the vision TEMBO has of making this education support program sustainable. Another addition will be including 15 students from Kimokouwa and Longido Primary Schools in a "Pre-TEC" program. This will allow TEMBO to help students become comfortable at reading and speaking English before they get to secondary school.

TEC has grown to the point that it would not be possible without the involvement of so many in Canada and the time, skills, and coordination of Mary Laiser and other TEMBO staff in Tanzania. This year we are especially grateful to the Ontario Teachers' Federation for a $5000.00 donation for TEC program expenses.

The education system in Tanzania is developing. Many feel it is not happening quickly enough. In February students at Ketumbeine Secondary School - where some of TEMBO's sponsored girls attend - "rioted" in protest of the poor quality teaching they were receiving. They publicly drew attention to an important reality: it is very difficult for rural schools in Tanzania to attract well trained teachers. This is not to say there are not good teachers in the countryside - it's just that there are very few of them.

All of us believe that the girls TEMBO sponsors can and will do better academically with help we can provide. We've got a lot to share thanks to the abundant and varied education opportunities we've had. And if some girls in Tanzania can gain confidence - through an enjoyable enriched learning program - that will help them do better in the classroom, then the time and effort running the TEC program is a very good investment.

Celebrating the Girls and Women of TEMBO

The girls and women I know in Longido and Kimokouwa are some of the strongest and most resilient people I have ever met. This year, on International Women's Day, March 8, I celebrate and give thanks for their lives.

Our lives are worlds apart in many ways. Most Tanzanian women live without the conveniences and blessings I often take for granted: running water, electricity, affordable quality education, good medical care, abundant food, and so much more. It is good that I can leave the comfort of my own life and culture to live in their world when I can. It helps me to put so much in perspective. I always return home feeling so much more grateful for what I have been given simply because I have been born in Canada.

Members of the KWGP group, their husbands, and village leaders.

Since my first visit to Tanzania in July 1998, I have watched little girls grow into beautiful young women and mothers. Some have chosen to remain in their bomas as traditional Maasai; some have had no say in making decisions about their lives; others have had courageous mothers who have pleaded on their behalf that their daughters might go to school; and there is a growing number of girls who have both parents wisely including education opportunities knowing that the world is changing for the Maasai as it is for people everywhere.

And isn't the world in transition? Few on this earth are not caught up in the fast moving current of change knocking at everyone's door. The women I am thinking of today want life for their daughters to be different than it is for them and they are willing to pay a high price to make this happen. They walk miles in search of firewood and water, spend long hours selling foodstuffs under the hot African sun to earn small amounts of money, and have had their lives given value by the number of cattle their husbands have "paid" for them.

Penina with her mother, daughter, and extended family.

I laud all the girls and women in Longido and Kimokouwa who have the audacity to dream for something better then they have today. I honour the women able to make small positive changes in their homes and families as a result of their participation in the micro-business program. And I honour the girls requesting education sponsorship and working hard to daily overcome great obstacles simply to stay in school.

Future generations will reap the rewards of your hopes and dreams, hard work and quiet sacrifices. And leaders will come from among you, even in your lifetime. I know this because I know you. You are a part of a great momentum composed of so many mothers and daughters all over the world. You are not alone. Happy International Women's Day!

Some of the TEMBO sponsored girls at the TEMBO English Camp, 2011.