education is key

I've been a Peace Corps Volunteer teacher at Andara Combined School in the Kavango region of Namibia for two years. There are between 600 and 700 learners at the school each year, about half of them girls, from villages so far in the bush that some kids stay at a hostel during the school term because they can't walk the 15km+ to school and home each day. The village is plagued with unemployment, single parents trying to support more kids than are their own and even homes with no parents, just school age kids living alone.

Gender equality is something we take for granted in the States, but in Andara, it's a foreign concept. Women are second class citizens, and it begins in childhood. There is little or no access to menstrual pads or tampons, so when girls reach puberty, they are forced to miss a week of school at a time, causing them to fail their grade, repeat and eventually drop out because they can't cope with so much absenteeism. Without an equal education, or even the opportunity for that, women will remain dependent on their male counterparts. Men control almost all aspects of a woman's life - from the financial side, to sex.

Kapapero Annafrieda is an incredibly bright 15 year old grade 6 learner at Andara Combined School. She transferred here in 2010 from another village after her mother passed away and she was sent to stay with distant relatives. At the end of period 8 one day, she called me over to where she quietly stood against the wall of the classroom while her 24 classmates yelled and screamed in their excitement that school was over for the day and they could go eat lunch.

"Madam, my skirt is not OK."

"What do you mean?" I asked her, trying to translate her concern from Namlish into English.

"My menstruation," was all she told me in explanation. She turned around to show me the stain that had been spreading for hours on her skirt, but there had been nothing she could do. Now she faced a 20 minute walk through the center of busy lunch time Andara on her way home.

"Wait a minute, I'll bring a dikehe," I told her as I left the classroom to quickly go to my house to bring her a traditional piece of cloth women use as a skirt covering. She wrapped herself in it and went home. I didn't see her for another 2 days.

Kutenda Petronella proved a promising grade 6 learner in 2009. I learned that she lives only with her younger sister and their grandmother who doesn't work. In 2010, she's begun missing too much school to allow her to pass the grade. On a Thursday in period 4, she called me over to her table.

"Madam, my menstruation."

Since it wasn't the end of the day, I wasn't sure how to tackle this same problem. I went to a couple teachers to ask for advice in what was culturally appropriate and school accepted protocol. She had to go home.

When the bell rang for break just 20 minutes later, Ms Shishanda and I sent all the other learners out of the classroom, Kutenda washed her chair, turned her skirt around and carried books in front of the stain. She had a 30 minute walk home. I didn't see her until late the following week.

This is the reality for too many young women in Andara. There is no money left after eating to buy basic necessities like pads or tampons.

GladRags in Portland, OR has agreed to help me battle this problem in Andara. GladRags makes reusable cotton pads, providing women and girls with reusable pads as a long term solution, compared to the disposable option. The environmental impact is also incredible, taking that waste out of the fires that are used to get rid of all trash. GladRags has agreed to sell these reusable pads at a discounted price for anyone who buys to donate to Andara Combined School. Visit the donation section of their website at http://www.gladrags.com/c-54-donate-pads.aspx and enter my home address (Lori Schippers, 623 Richardson Road, Ashby, MA 01431) as the shipping address, to order as many reusable cotton pads as you want. Everything you order will be sent to Andara!

Thank you for helping give girls at Andara Combined School an equal education to that of their male peers.

Stay well,
Lori

PS - You know someone I don't know? SPREAD THE WORD! The most important thing you can give a child is an education, and if giving them reusable pads is what it takes to GET them that education, we have a social responsibility to do that.