School Donations
As Behind the Scenes travelers explore the world with us and meet our old friends and new acquaintances, they make wonderful connections everywhere! The local people show touching generosity and goodwill. And we’re all welcomed into homes, studios, offices, markets, shops, and schools. Behind the Scenes Adventures has asked travelers to consider bringing things to give away for over two decades — and you all have been so generous! Often when we visit a school, and start talking with teachers and principals, we discover a pressing need for BTSA Help projects and/or donations of supplies.
The West African school visits can warm your heart, and break it too.
Classrooms are crowded beyond belief. Students often lack basics such as books and chalkboards. Sometimes students must sit on the floor or the ground because there are not enough chairs or desks. Or there is no bathroom, as you will see in the Senegal story below.
The generous BTSA travelers have taken up the call, and on every trip, they bring school supplies and books that the group delivers to one of three schools we have adopted in West Africa. Naturally we are aware that these efforts are the proverbial ‘drop in a bucket,’ but donations have been received with heartfelt gratitude by the teachers and principals, and with joy by the students.
Morocco
We have recently partnered with the California-based Olive Seed NGO to bring books to Morocco’s remote villages in the high Atlas Mountains. The dynamic OliveSeed founder Barb Mackraz started Morocco Library Project in January 2014. Libraries are primarily in Amazigh (Berber) communities in desert and mountain areas. Collaboration with teachers and students helps to understand the local context, and thus to curate an exciting and appealing book collection for them. Working with after-school English clubs, they also co-develop project-based programs including creative writing and the collection of oral stories. The November 2024 Morocco BTSA travelers will again bring books for two libraries. Visit the Olive Seed library and book projects.
Senegal
On our first trip to this part of Senegal, Behind the Scenes travelers brought several duffle bags of school supplies to give out to a special school. Idrissa, the BTSA van driver (for whom education is very important), knew of a school that needed supplies. So one morning we stopped and met the Principal, Mr. Sy, at a school along our route. He showed us his small office and two bare-walled classrooms, plus a third temporary bamboo-walled space where students were working on French grammar on a free-standing blackboard.
We gave Mr. Sy the many pens, pencils, notebooks, and so forth that people had brought to donate. Of course he was very happy, and very touched by their generosity. He impressed us all with his sincerity and devotion to his students.
Then we went around back, where a 5-foot length of light bamboo fencing had been propped up in a semi-circle, around a dirt area that was the girls’ “bathroom.” Mr. Sy said what they really needed was a decent bathroom for the girls so they could have privacy and not be teased by boys walking by. As we walked back to the van, we all felt a bit stunned at the conditions. But Ruth A. of New York declared that she was going to do something about the lack of a girls’ bathroom!
So over the next few months, many email and phone conversations resulted in Ruth’s sending money for the project. The plan was two cement block bathrooms each, for girls and boys. Barou kept in close contact with Mr. Sy, as a “project manager” from afar. Frequent photo updates showed the hundreds of cement blocks being made on site for the project. Ruth had frequent progress updates — until yesterday when we received these photos of finished bathrooms! One person can make such a difference. Bravo Ruth!
Segou, Mali
Another school we visit is Barou’s old elementary school in his hometown of Ségou. The situation there has changed drastically from when he actually learned the 3 Rs. He was shocked to find that his 8-year old nephew has 168 other students in his chaotic classroom, with one teacher and her assistant. At this school, the last two BTSA groups to visit Mali with us donated big bags of pens and pencils, chalk, erasers and composition books. We are anxious to return to Mali with groups and continue the BTSA school projects as soon as the country becomes more peaceful.
We follow Jeff Greenwald’s “Ethical Traveler” guidelines, making a point of not handing out anything to kids in the street — because among other problems, this can create a wild scramble, with fistfights among the would-be recipients. Donated school supplies are always handed directly to the school director or teacher in charge because they know how to distribute the items fairly. Teachers sometimes save special pens or fancy pencils and notebooks for class prizes.
Volta Region, Ghana
Barou, with Augustine, the principal, who is receiving the BTSA donations for her students.
In Ghana, there is another little school that we have become very attached to, in the south-eastern area called Volta Region, close to the Togolese border. It’s also a primary (elementary) school with a fanatically devoted principal named Augustine. Classrooms are not as crowded here as in the Malian schools, but they have equally bare walls. The children here wear uniforms and have shining faces because Augustine has good communication and rapport with the parents. She insists that the students come to school with clean faces and clean uniforms.
Over the past few years, many BTSA group members have brought rulers, colored chalk, paper pads, and so forth, even children’s books, because English is spoken in Ghana. Tedi Siminowsky even cajoled her Berkeley, CA, book club into donating a whole duffle bag of supplies for this school!
Tedi, standing at right-center, and BTSA group, being thanked by Augustine and other teachers.
Sometimes Behind the Scenes Adventures help projects take the form of medical aid. Tedi also brought a large bag of medical supplies for the Bandiagara Hospital Clinic when she traveled to Mali. I called a physician friend in Bamako to be sure the items would be useful in a dusty, rural hospital before she departed the USA with them.
He said none of the items needed high-tech connections to be used properly. But Barou was nervous about the supplies being sold to patients by someone at the hospital, so he called in the City Mayor and a local newspaper reporter to witness the hand-off of thousands of dollars of pediatric medical supplies. He made sure the Mayor and everyone attending knew the items were being DONATED and were to be distributed free when needed. Apparently, BTSA was even in the local paper, but we didn’t get to see a copy of the article…
Peru and Bolivia
Knitters traveling to Peru and Bolivia bring extra yarn and needles for knitters. They also bring the little hotel bottles of shampoo and soaps so prized by the women living in the rural Andean highlands. Beverly Johnson of Santa Fe, NM, is the “Champion of Andean Giving;” one year she knit 27 colorful sweaters for toddlers in the mountain villages. The next year, she knit 36 pairs of warm socks for village kids in the Cuzco area. My friend Nilda Callañaupa who travels to the knitting villages with us, had to devise a lottery system for the sweaters and socks because everyone wanted them!
We hope that if you decide to travel with Behind the Scenes Adventures, you’ll consider bringing items to donate for BTSA help projects. Ask what is appropriate and most needed in specific areas. Every little bit can help, and you have been most generous so far!