Ramadan is a big holidy. There are even special lights to help celebrate it at "the traffic light", the first traffic light in The Gambia, and the Africell headquarters. This was a nice outing on what was my last full night in The Gambia.
All the UTG students and faculty involved in this project volunteered. The did a great job, but Clinic projects like this should provide a credit component to give the students incentives and rewards for their hard work. I hope that will be offered in the future.
Holding kids attention can be a challenge under even the best of circumstances. Our law students used some inventive ways to hold kids attention. Above is a drama used to demonstrate how children can end up being trafficked. Below, midway through a 2 hour class, they got the kids up and moving.
We had another group of law students present at St. Teresa's school. They ccovered children's rights to education, the law against child marriage and FGM. The group on the right covered human trafficking. They also provided detailed information on how to get help if these problems arise, perhaps the most important piece of the lesson. [...]
Ambassador Pat Alsup, an Obama appointee, invited me to meet with her at her office early in my Fulbright Specialist work with the Law Clinic in The Gambia. She clearly understood the mission to teach students the law while serving the community. So I asked her to come speak at the law school and she [...]
These girls are getting an education. Not all girls are so fortunate. This is a global issue. Child marriage is a related issue we struggled with in the Law Clinic in The Gambia. The Gambia law clearly requires a person to be 18 to marry, unless Sharia law is interpreted to provide an exception. This [...]
On the left you see what I think of as The Gambian version of the Hokey Pokey. I wish I had a video. On the right is more of a lecture approach. These and other styles were used to teach about a variety of subjects. The right to an education, privacy, freedom of association, human [...]
Our goal is to make the Street Law lessons practical, everyday lessons that engage the students in critical thinking. I think our law students pulled this off pretty well.
It was sunny, about 30C/86F in Kotu last Tuesday. There was a nice breeze if you were under a tree, but not in a classroom with 50 students. The electricity was out, so even the overhead fans were still. We taught right after lunch, but most of these students didn't have lunch. It is Ramadan [...]
A short walk from where we landed in Juffureh (statue on the right) took us to the Slavery museum in Albreda. Sobering reminders of terrible inhumane treatment. http://afrotourism.com/attraction/juffureh-the-museum-of-slavery-albreda/
