It has been awhile since I last wrote an update on my ongoing project with MAJ and ASBEF.
Following the International Conference on Family Planning, things have definitely calmed down a bit, but there is still much to be done before leaving in July. The conference turned out to be not only a great way for MAJ members to participate and learn from the international community of reproductive and sexual health professionals, but it was also an excellent means for MAJ members to promote their own activities.
Post-conference, the MAJ Twitter account has been really advancing. We are up to almost 100 followers, which I realize is not a huge number, but considering a couple months ago when we had no Twitter account and little interaction with the greater reproductive health community, I would say that we are off to a pretty good start. Through Twitter, we are regularly interacting, sharing information with, and asking questions of IPPF, the international parent organization funding ASBEF, as well as engaging both Senegalese youth and young people from around the world in dialogue. I’m also finding that Twitter is a great way to share professional resources from other reproductive health organizations on the social media site, and we have been using Twitter to track down a number of helpful resources in French for MAJ activities.
Our YouTube channel also has some new features. The channel is a bit more put together now, with additional videos, playlists, and other featured channels. We’ve also made contact through YouTube with a group called Scenarios from Africa, a project originally created by two Emory University professors to create short skits about HIV/AIDS in Africa for young people. 2 particularly cool things about this program: 1) the ideas from the skits are submitted to the organization by African youth between the ages of 10-25, 2) The films are then translated into over 25 languages found in Africa, from the colonial languages like French, English, and Portuguese, to local languages like Wolof and Pulaar (those two I was particularly excited about). I’ve embedded a particularly funny video below dubbed into English, though you can check them all out at Scenarios from Africa's YouTube channel. One of Scenarios from Africa’s local partners is ACI Baobab, the NGO through which I took classes during my first study abroad experience in Senegal. I am hoping soon to meet with someone at ACI to look into the possibilities of MAJ members submitting story ideas for the next round of selections for films.
In other news, just under half of the funds raised remain and I am trying, along with MAJ members and ASBEF staff, to decide how best to use what is left. I recently visited ASBEF Guédiawaye to begin the process of figuring out what the MAJ group there needs in terms of additional programmatic and technical support. Hopefully, some of the remaining funds will go towards helping this smaller MAJ group out in the suburbs of Dakar – an area that is historically poorer with less access to health information and clinical care.
Along with the help of another MAJ member living in the suburbs, I am also looking into helping finance and support a youth center that could be run by MAJ members in another suburb called Thiaroye. While Thiaroye and Guédiawaye aren’t too far away from each other geographically, transportation difficulties and unbelievable traffic jams as people try to get in and out of the city make it much harder for youth in Thiaroye to access services or be involved with MAJ Guédiwaye. This MAJ member happens to have an empty room attached to his apartment complex and was interested in turning the space into a resource center for youth, where they could come and get information about reproductive health, free condoms, and perhaps be referred to near-by health centers as needed. It would also be a place to hold activities and education events. I thought this was a wonderful idea, especially because the space is not being used, and it is in a low-income neighborhood with a lot of young people living in and around the area. We are in the planning stages now, but are hoping to schedule a sort-of town hall meeting in Thiaroye with youth to discuss how they feel the space could best be used.
This sort of project is particularly exciting to me because there is just so much that could be done with a space like this for relatively little money, and we get to begin from square one – meaning that community members (i.e. youth) will have input from the beginning into what this youth center could look like.
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