This year has been a very progressive year for the Port of Harlem Gambian Education Partnership. We worked hard to document what we have accomplished and why you, current, past, and new donors should trust us. We provide you five 60-second videos showing our progress.

Inflation has risen more in The Gambia than in the United States. For instance, when our Gambian children buy bread and beans for lunch, they face a 50 percent cost increase this year compared to just three years ago. “Food is a problem here, I am telling you,” Jabel Ceesay, who administers the program for us in The Gambia, reminded me.

Gambian inflation caused us to raise the scholarship requests slightly, but we did not have to raise it much because the dollar is very strong against the dalasi, the local currency. A strong dollar means that your donation will go further in the Gambia than last year or in the United States.

Our first priority is to the 19 students who have K-12 scholarships. Last year we tackled, for the first time, the issue of dropouts. Among the 19 students, one guy left the scholarship program to pursue interests in football (soccer) and the other got pregnant and married. Though they are no longer in school, we are following them and trying to support their growth.

Our second priority is restocking the Baobab Youth Development Association - Phillis Wheatley library. The learning center lost books due to a flood of unprecedent magnitude. However, we are very, very grateful for the new book donations we have boxed and ready to go, but to pay for boat shipping fees to The Gambia, on Africa’s Smiling Coast, and need your help.

We have enough new and very gently used books to also send some books to the Methodist Special School for Challenged Students and its sister school for non-special needs students, plus start a new library in Soma.

The new library, the Mballa Abib Joof - Hajji Omar Ibn Sayyid Memorial Library, in Soma's founder is Madani Joof. He is naming the small library after his late father plus historic Gambian-American Sayyid. The library fund covers such expenses.

Lastly, our general overhead fund covers such expenses as money transfers, whose costs have gone down significantly in the internet age. However, the cost of maintaining a web page to collect donations and to share information has gone up very significantly. 

We also use money from this fund to pay for such smaller projects such as for the locally made soap we donate to charities such as to the Tanka Tanka Psychiatric Hospital and buying exercise (writing) books for a program that empowers young women by teaching them about menstruation and how to properly care for themselves.

Thanks,

Wayne
President, Port of Harlem Gambian Education Parnership
Publisher, Port of Harlem magazine

P.S. We also installed the newest permanent exhibit “From These Shores” at the Juffureh Slavery Museum. A bequest from Kevin Turner provided the funds.