Project School Uniforms for Gambia

Project School Uniforms for Gambia

As a person I am usually very curious and when I travel I ask a lot of questions to learn more about the country I visit.

When I visited Gambia I was astonished to see so many kids in school age in the streets, playing around instead of going to school. When I inquired about the school system, I was told that the basic education was free. This made it even more difficult for me to understand why the kids were not in school, so I continued my questions.

Then I found out that to go to school and attend classes, it was compulsory to have a school uniform. Though quite simple uniforms, but all the same, many families could not afford to buy the required school uniform for their child, and thus the kid could not go to school. That’s why the children could not benefit from the so called free education. I did not ask about schoolbooks, pencils etc, but guess that might be a problem as well.

The uniforms are very simple, so I wondered why the mothers do not sew the uniforms for their kids, because without education they have no chance in life. Thus I found out that a sewing machine is so costly that these poor families could never ever afford to buy even the simplest machine second-hand, and most of them did not know how to sew.

From here my idea started that all children should have a chance to go to school, and at least at least all Ahmadi children should be able to go to school. Their future and entire life would be wasted if they could not even read and write. Thus I made a plan to help the children.

In this way I planned a program. I did it all by my own, but I talk to the Amir in Gambia and got his permission to try to fulfill my plans.

Now I bought 15 machines (10 hand driven, 4 foot pedal type and one electric, which could make embroidery as well). The reason for my choice of hand driven and foot pedal machines was that the electricity is very expensive and many households would not be able to carry the extra electricity cost for using an electric machine. I bought the machines from my own money and I did not ask for any contributions.

The Amir very kindly et me use a house which was temporary empty, but in the same compound as the Ahmadiyya hospital in Banjul. After talking to some ladies I started a sewing class in the house suggested by the Amir. Since this was my own project I wanted to do all the work myself, and I did not want to burden the Lajnah, though I informed about my scheme.

When I had set up the machines and arranged them, the Amir, Baba F. Tarawally, along with Kausu Kinte, the chairman of Humanity Firs, came to see the machines. They prayed for the good use of the machines and for the success of my project. Then I started my sewing class.

“Sewing café”: After talking to some Ahmadi ladies I knew, I decided to make it be something like a “sewing café”, e.g. all the machines were to be kept in one place, e.g. the house which the Amir had let me use. No one could borrow a machine and bring it home. All machines had to be kept in one place, but any Lajnah member who so wanted to sew, could just drop in and use the machines. The ladies could use the machines to sew anything they likes, whether their own clothes or their children’s clothes and school uniforms to save money or even sew items to be sold to earn a little extra.

The first class: The first class was planned to last for two weeks. 15 Lajnah members took part from the beginning. We had only15 machines and the room was not so big, so it was impossible to let in more than 15, but there was a long cue outside the house of others who wanted to join, if any place would be vacant. Within these two weeks I planned for the women to sew one traditional dress for herself. All managed and some sew even managed to sew something for their kids as well, and the program seemed to be very successful.

Traditional dress: Since I thought that many of the women might not understand the urgent need of education, I wanted to tempt them to take part in my class by letting them start learning to sew a traditional Gambian dress for themselves. My idea was that when they could sew this dress, they could easily sew the school uniforms, since the ladie’s dress was more difficult and if they could master it, they could easily manage sewing the school uniforms.

Economy: The Ahmadi women could use the machines freely and without any cost, but they were told that if they broke a needle for example, they would have to replace it, but apart from that they did not need to worry about any costs. Thus all costs were to be covered by me alone.

Educational level: Most of the ladies could not at all use a sewing machine or sew at all, so the first step was to tech them how to use the hand driven machines. The second step was to teach how to cut their dress. Many had never held scissors in their hands and did not know how to use it. They had to exercise cutting paper first, before they could cut material for clothes. And many had never used a needle, but had to learn to thread it and to use it.

I got help: Some ladies already knew how to cur the material and to sew, and I requested them to help me out in their free time, since the number of ladies who wanted to learn how to sew was far too big for me to handle alone. I am particularly grateful to Mariama Darboe. When I write this in 2024, she is the national Sadr Lajnah in Gambia. At the time of my sewing class in 2010 she helped the ladies to cut and sew their dresses and thanks to her help the class was a great success

A queu: The room where we held the class was not so big, and there were not so many machines, so we had to limit the number of ladies sewing to a maximum of 14 ladies at a time – but there was a long queue outside the door of women waiting to get a chance to join in. They stood there patiently and as soon as one lady left the room, another one entered.

Achievements: Within the limit of two weeks, all ladies taking part in the sewing class managed to sew her dress. Some sew additional items, like clothes for their children.

Sister-to-sister program: In line with the first project, I planned for another step. Thus I told the women that whenever they visited someone who could not sew or when going to the far off villages, it would be a good thing if they could bring their skill long with them, and in their turn train more women. I told the women that in this way they should go out and try to teach the women in the villages to sew, and that this training should be given free of charge, in the same way that I had taught them for free. I called this plan a “sister-to-sister” program. It was my intention to try to save money enough to buy one hand driven sewing machine for each village they visited.

Dr. Qanita