Blog
Friday, 23 February 2024 18:15

January 2024

Written by Fundacion

 

2024, WE KEEP GROWING

We have begun the year with renewed energy thanks to the addition of new friends to the Foundation's structure. This step not only brings new ideas but also guarantees continuity. We are pleased to welcome young people joining the Board of Trustees and the management of the Foundation. Raimón Masllorens Escubos, as Vice President, Nelida Sánchez Lago, and Aldo Rovira García-Marca as trustees (joined by Alejandra Montesino-Espartero París, who joined in 2023). These new members have visited us in Senegal and, after witnessing firsthand the work done over time, have decided to join our project.

VOLUNTEERING

The constant influx of volunteers, especially those with a solid background in technology, has been essential. José María Catot, who has been a volunteer since 2017, has decided to settle permanently in Senegal to collaborate on the ground and oversee projects closely.

VISITS

We have received visits from families, groups of friends, and students, some of whom have chosen to live with the villagers or students in our residence.

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Thursday, 15 June 2023 17:57

YEAR 2022-2023

Written by Fundacion

 

The doors of the school are about to close, until the beginning of October. Our
students are preparing for exams, each level on a different date.


Kindergarteners are over. The primary ones also finished and in what was
refers to Mbackombel, those who are doing CM2 (last year of primary school) will have a week
more work as they take the national entrance exams for secondary school and

Obtain the CFEE (Certificate of Elementary Studies)


Our students from the Mbour Residence will finish later (end of June some, end of
July others), depending on whether they are secondary, high school or vocational training students)


These days we have a nice number of graduates who have come from
Barcelona, in order to help them prepare for the exam. We have also had the visit
From Marco Brucker and your son Gabriel and also Susana Castro, Marco Brucker who has helped them plan their schedules and the work to be done.


Soon we will announce the results of the exams!


For months now, our friend and volunteer, José María, has been constantly helping, in
the land, so that everything works correctly, mainly in the Residence.


Many are the volunteers who are passing through our residence. YOU SIGN UP? www.puse.org

 

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Tuesday, 07 February 2023 18:09

Building bridges and playing jigsaw puzzles.

Written by Fundacion

 

I arrived to the student’s residence of Por una Sonrisa en África in Mbour in January 2019. I had been looking for a while for a charity to support and a friend recommended them. I sent an email to Mario and he replied with a warm welcome into his lifetime project. I sent my cv and support letter and I was accepted to volunteer at the primary care centre in Mbour Sérère, close to the student’s residence. During that first January and the following one, I spent my mornings helping at the primary care centre. My afternoons were at the student’s residence of Por una Sonrisa en África, with the students, helping them with their English homework, but mainly playing UNO and hangman with them in English, of course!

 

One day, I took a puzzle from the shelf and started to make it on one of the tables of the study room. I would sit amongst the students making a puzzle, while they were doing their homework or preparing classes for the following day. Soon I realized that starting and finishing a jigsaw puzzle was to them an exceptional achievement. Even the brightest students thought that making a jigsaw puzzle was an extraordinary and genius phenomenon. They would not know how to start the puzzle, relate shapes and colours, pay attention to detail or have patience. However, they would continue to write and solve long mathematical equations on the blackboard. Por una Sonrisa en África has given these children of the Senegalese savanna the incredible opportunity of schooling with education always being their priority to reach primary, secondary and higher studies. Amongst their graduates they have doctors, nurses and teachers. But developing as a human being not only involves academical work, learning to skilfully play is a vital part of growing. Those skills will be the necessary tools to become an adult able to perform the daily chores of our future jobs and lives.

 

This January 2023 I returned to Mbour after three years of the covid pandemic and lots of work. It has only been 10 days of chats about health, brainstorming and mainly shared moments. I arrived with a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle in my rucksack. I am leaving with it finished on one of the tables of the study room. We finished it in seven days. And I say ‘we’, because the younger students helped with patience and attention to detail. Clearly, something has changed from that first puzzle in 2019.

 

Often my friends ask me about what is it that I exactly do in Senegal. I often reply that I come to build bridges. Thank you to Por una Sonrisa en África for offering me the opportunity of building bridges towards a fairer world. An African proverb says that the footprints of those walking together never get erased. Today I am going back to London with the warmth of the Senegalese teranga under my skin.

 

Dr María Gómez Rodriguez,

General Practitioner

Senegal, January 2023

 

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Wednesday, 23 November 2022 19:53

New technologies?

Written by Fundacion

 

During the year that is about to end, our work has continued in the line that we "drew" in our beginnings (2002). Education and formation.

 

Over the years, we have been seeing the evolution of our town Mbackombel.

 

When we arrived, 94% of the residents were illiterate and could only understand you if you spoke Serer, their dialect.

 

Currently 75% know how to write, speak French and a few... a lot more things.

 

We wanted to get to this point. Currently we can be proud to have among our first students, nurses, midwives, university students (doctor, biologist, environmentalist, English philologist, management secretary and so on, many more).

 

But, thanks to a friend and volunteer, José Mª Catot, we have decided to go further... to introduce a group of selected students to the field of new technologies (ICT).

 

To reach this level, we have managed to get many highly qualified people to volunteer, coming to the "field" and organizing workshops on different specialties (programming, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, etc.).

 

We want to thank: those who have collaborated this year: Isabel Águeda Serrano, Ana Isabel Alegre López, Juan Manuel Pérez Villar, Tania Correas González, Clara Gregori Pla, Xavi Vergés, Jordi Bonet and Albert Balbi and welcome the who have already signed up for 2023 (Alicia Alonso, Toni Juanico, Charo Carrió Zubeldia, Jordi Sorribes i Burgués, Alicia Alonso, Alfonso Bosch, Alejandra Montesino, Clara Gifra, Aldo Rovira and Lucía Pursals).

 

We are making progress reach our students!

 

THANKS TO ALL OF YOU WHO ARE THERE!!!

 

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Wednesday, 31 August 2022 15:36

Malick

Written by Fundacion

 

In mid - 2008, during one of our regular visits in our health post, we met a woman with a son who is 8 years old waiting for a medical consultation.


Malick, is the name of the child, a dwarf (achondroplasia). When we asked her mother if she took him to school, she thought that we were laughed at her.


His family, threatened to be expulsed, because did not have the means and we proposed that she let us take him to Mbackombel (a village) so that he could study in our school and live with the village’s children. He always has good marks at school.


At a later date, when he finished (Malick) his primary studies, we decide to take him to our boarding school in Mbour. There, he also has good marks at the secondary school.


Lastly, he followed training in an academy as an electrician and panel solar technician after two years of study.


He was the best student of his class and now he is ready and want to financially help his family.


These little stories push us to continue the project we have started since 2002 in the educational et social domain.


We would like to thank her sponsor who has financed a professional training.

 

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