It’s a fair question. And for some time, I didn’t even really know the answer, but ten months in and I’m finally getting into the swing of things. The language, the work, the people–all of it seems to be coming a little bit easier now. Alhamdulillah!
So, I’ve been in Senegal for ten months now—can you believe it? Time has really been flying and I figured it was time that I gave a quick peek on the stuff I’ve been working on. I’ll try to keep it short. Sort of.
Women’s Group Garden
A common request when I arrived in village was to restart a garden that had been very popular two years ago, but had failed because the well had collapsed and there was no longer a source of water for the garden—making it very hard to maintain during any period that isn’t rainy season. The women in my village told me over and over again that they wanted more work—a way to make more money for their household—and collectively we decided that restarting the garden would be a good way to hit several birds with one large stone. (Sorry birds)
Ideally this large garden (35 meters by 50 meters) will answer several issues in village, including high rates of malnutrition, low access to nutritious/fresh food, and low/nonexistent incomes of women, as they will be able to sell the produce they do not eat within the village (increasing the access of fresh food to the entire village, not just the participants of the Garden Group).
Each woman will participate in trainings, including:
- Financial literacy re: personal finances and saving
- Agricultural/gardening training (amending soil to improve the quality, when to plant what vegetables, pest management, etc.)
- Healthy eating habits, specifically how to make healthier meals based on each woman’s status (pregnant, mother of young children under 5, etc.) and the vegetables available in the garden
Combined, all of the trainings will continue to increase the agency and health status of each woman and, by consequence, their families.
The garden space itself is still under construction, but we have been awarded grant money through USAID’s now closing food security initiative, Feed the Future, to buy the needed materials, supplies, and labor to create a successful garden space. Thanks FTF!
Vaccination Campaigns & Data Management
The Poste de Santé in my village is working in partnership with the Global Alliance for Vaccinations and Immunizations (GAVI) to increase coverage of children under 2 who have been vaccinated against preventable diseases. Prior to GAVI’s involvement, I was working on sensitization within my community (which basically just means, talking to people in casual/comfortable environments to try to explain the importance of vaccinating children—even though they may cry a lot during the injections…), but shortly after some of the community health workers (CHWs) in my village went to a training hosted by GAVI on mobilizing the community around increasing vaccination, so the project has grown tremendously.
My role in this, as I’m not a medical professional nor will I ever be, has become more of an administrative/managerial role as I assist coordination of the vaccination campaigns in all 14 villages in my commune. But my biggest contribution has been my ability to input and manipulate data in a meaningful way that makes tracking the children who have been vaccinated, or not, more intuitive and easier to manage.
The health structures, from the smallest community clinic to the regional hospitals, use large bound notebooks (probably 12 inches tall and 18 inches wide) to track all kinds of health data—birthdates, vaccination records, malnutrition data, etc.—which can make it impossible to find one baby named Aminata (a very common name) from a village of 1,200 people. Creating some kind of data management that is easy to use is, in my opinion, a key part of moving the quality of care in Senegal to the next level.
Well, those are the two biggest things I’m working on in village right now and other things, like the Michele Slyvester Scholarship (MSS) award-winners deserve their own post, so I’ll leave it at that for now.
Sounds pretty cool, right? Well, yeah, it kind of is! I’ve been having such a good time getting settled into work here. Lucky for me, Peace Corps Senegal really gives you space to make your service what you want to be and for that, I’m very thankful.
I’ll keep you all updated on how these two bigger projects look moving forward—hopefully everything continues moving smooth-ish (or at least, as smoothly as they can with language barriers, cultural differences around work, and my own general fatigue due to my new status as part-time vegetarian).
Here’s to 2017 and all the work and weird experiences that inevitably will come my way!
Not All That Glitters Is Gold 