THE HISTORY & BACKGROUND OF THE SCHOOL

In 2006 we spent several days of our time in The Gambia at the school and on one of them Vic was able to record an interview with Mrs Jallow that ranged over several aspects of her background, teaching career and the reasons for founding Aji Awa Bah School. It seems to give important insights into the very special person that has contributed so much to education in The Gambia in her lifetime.

First of all, could I thank you for welcoming us back to your school again. We are always very happy to be here.
Thank you.

And we are very happy to be sponsoring a little girl here…
Tina.

… and we can see already that she is very happy to be here and getting a lot from being here.
First of all, tell us something about yourself.
My name is Yaharr Jallow and I am a retired teacher. I have taught for 35 years in primary schools, teaching different ages from 7 to 13. After that children proceed to secondary school, so for the best part of my life I have been dealing with children of those ages.

Now when we were talking earlier, we seemed to have qualified as teachers at about the same time. I was at college in 1964 and I qualified in 1967.
Ah! I went to college on 4th October 1962 and I qualified on 23rd July 1965.
Well, I can't be as precise as you! So have you taught in a number of schools in that time?
I have taught in a number of schools in different parts of The Gambia. My first teaching was in a village called Sanyang, not very far from Gunjur. Sanyang is a fishing village; then I taught in Yundum; then I taught in Saraba Banta. I taught in Georgetown in the provinces, where you have the slave house….

Yes, we have been there.
I taught in Georgetown from 1969 to 1970 at the Methodist Georgetown Primary. From there I was taken back to Sanyang because they were very happy to have me as a role model because then, sending girls to school was a problem, making the child accustomed. Teaching children in The Gambia was thought to be making the child a Christian because the schools were started by missionaries, so anything to do with education was associated with Christianity, so I was taken to Sanyang to mobilise the parents there and to show that if a European man can do it, so can an African woman. So I was twice teaching in Sanyang, so in 1972, I was transferred to Serrekunda Primary School and I was there until 1975. In 1975, I was posted to Bakau Primary School and I taught there until 1977 when I was promoted. I don't know what the system is like in England, but for us, after several years of teaching experience, we are given other responsibilities and you can apply for senior posts.

It is the same in England.
And if you are lucky, you are selected and promoted. So in 1977, I was promoted as Senior Mistress in charge if the Infant Department. I was concentrating on children 7, 8 and 9, the grades 1 to 3. In 1980, I was taken to a Windley Primary School in Banjul, named after a former governor of The Gambia, and I became deputy head. It wasn't a very big school. It had a role of about 1,500.

A small school?
Yes, in The Gambia, you have schools that have roles of over 4,000 so Windley was a small school. In The Gambia, schools are classified, A,B,C,D,E according to their size. Now from Windley, I was promoted to Latrikunda as a Senior Mistress in a Class C school. In 1984, I was made a Deputy in the same school. In 1985, I was posted to Brikama Primary in a class E school, the largest, with over 4,000 pupils. In 1986, I delivered a little girl and that was my last child and I was posted back to Bakau Primary, because I had fever there and my health was not very good. The commuting was not good for my health. They decided to take me to a school nearer my home. So from then up until 1994, I was in Bakau Primary School as a senior mistress in charge of the infant department. Bakau School is a much bigger school. It is the oldest school in the Kombos, founded in 1947. Started by missionaries in 1946, but taken over by the government in 1949. I was in Bakau Primary up until 1994 when I was promoted and went to a new school, New Jeswang Primary from 1994- 1996 as deputy head. In 1996, I was again promoted and taken to New Bakau School where I was the head teacher and stayed until my retirement in 2000.

So you retired from teaching in 2000…. But you don't seem to be having a very restful retirement. Why are you still running a school when you are retired?
Well, I 'retired' but I am not 'tired'.

You clearly still have a lot of energy!
Retirement age in The Gambia was 55 then. Now, it has been increased to 60.

The same as England.
Yes, you know we have been colonised by Britain for 300 years and most of our education system is copied from England. Now voluntary retirement in The Gambia is at 60 and compulsory retirement at 65.
I have a very strong love for children I came from very poor parents and I have realised the great benefits of education. As a result, I sympathise with the poor. I always believed that I could help the children of the poor to live a better life. My mother was a market seller. With the little she earned, she was able to send me to school and not my brothers and sisters. I am the only one in my family to be educated to the level that I am so that I can enjoy the standard of living that I can. As a result, I have a lot of dependencies. In The Gambia, we believe in sharing. I believe that if I am privileged to have such an opportunity, why not try to help others to have the same.
So I retired and took my gratuity and I decided to build a three-classroom block. With the lump sum that I was paid, I told my children, "I am going to use that money to build a school and in that school, I am going to help the children of the poor and the needy; especially the girls to encourage their education." As I have said, I am privileged. I know what my sisters went through, my cousins too; women who have children, who are divorced, who are dependent on their family, whose children are not happy. Now me, with or without a husband, I would be able to lead a happy life. I believe that that is an opportunity that I should share. So now I can give some employment to teachers, give a start to poor children and I believe that in this school, we will be able to give quality education.

Well, I have seen quality teaching in this school. The standards are good. I have been to quite a number of schools in The Gambia and this is the happiest and the most vibrant that I have been to.
My main objective is to bring quality education to the young children of the Bakau community; to every child in Bakau, I want to bring quality education to their doorsteps.
Now, in The Gambia, all nursery education is private, run by private institutions which makes it expensive.

Not funded by the government at all?
Not at all. We are not provided with buildings, materials, anything. So, you open your own school. You apply…. You meet your strictures…. They come and inspect and if approval is given, you have to pay an admission fee to The Organisation of Early Childhoo Education then you are established.

At the beginning in 2001 and 2002, things were so difficult for me that at the end of the month, to pay those teachers was a problem. I would have to fall back into my pension allowance to pay my teachers' salaries. We had just two classes but the problem was affordability. The children are here, but at the end of the month, at the end of the term, the poor parents don't have the money to pay. They would come and appeal but you cannot say at the end of the month, "I have not been paid so you cannot be paid." In fact, that would frustrate them and satisfactory service would not be given, so I said, "I will fall back on my pension money and then I will be able to pay them."

But your school has grown since those days.
Yes, because the children are what they are and they are selling the school, because there are a lot of nursery schools in The Gambia….in Bakau and in the surroundings. Parents say they will take their children to more expensive nursery schools. They will commute, they will pay a lot of money, but then those children would come back to Bakau. They would play, they would associate with our children and when our children go home, the parents can hear the language work that we do. The children memorise easily; they learn very quickly. They can count, they know the days of the week, the months of the year, naming many objects. People…parents are amazed and they say, "We will send our child to Mrs Yaharr Jallow's school." As a result, in fact, this is creating some problems because of congestion; we are very overcrowded at the moment, only three classrooms and 245 children and parents are coming every day, they sit for hours, just waiting to see if their child will be accepted. Well, that child was accepted and then she brought another child and said, "These two, they are always together. They need to be at school together. The other child is feeling left out" so you have to do what you can.

Well, if I look at your block of three classrooms and then I look across the yard, I can see rubble; it is almost like a building site…. I can see a few blocks there. Have you plans for this area that we are now looking at?
Sure! In fact here. There was a shop here, but we decided to demolish the shop and we have drawn up plans for two more classrooms and an office and storeroom on that side. One first year class will be the middle block and I have decided to make that room bigger; a room with a lot of toys….sand…. water. Things the children can really play with. The one at the end would be the second youngest class, at this end would be my office where I can do my work and have meetings with parents and visitors. We would have a storeroom behind it; take out the cupboards with teaching materials from the classrooms so that there would be more room.
My main problem now is to build this structure in order to get the two classes that are being taught outside here each with 47 children in each.

Well, I can see that you will manage this on a beautifully sunny day like today, but when we come to the rainy season….
In fact, before the rainy season, you will have the very windy days when the sand will blow…. The children would be covered with sand and dust. It is terrible, not conducive for teaching and learning, but it must be endured. The only joy I have is that the children are happy, but I am sure that they would be happier in a room. We have to put canvas from the trees; we have nowhere to put out teaching aids. When the rain comes it is a big problem. During the day, by midday the children will be sweating.

So the building of a new classroom block, you buy the sand….
Yes, we buy the sand and cement and then we can make the blocks. Then we buy stone gravel and more cement to make the foundations of the structure. In fact, I have made a budget for the amount of materials needed; the cost of labour, corrugated iron sheets, wood, windows, doors and roughly it comes to £3, 000. You would have a very solid block

Then there would be all the classroom furniture.
Yes, you would need desks, tables, chairs for one classroom, the other would be more of a playroom for the beginners. We would have tiles for the floors in that classroom to make it more comfortable, then we would have our rugs and mats to spread them on the floor for the children with something soft in case the younger children fall asleep. Outside, I feel guilty when I see the young ones falling asleep as the others are learning. We put jumpers over them, but in a classroom, we could have a corner for them and we would call it the resting area. That's what it was like when we started; we had the middle class for the youngest ones. Some of the activities, like painting, make the young ones very tired and they can have a rest then. We would just allow themselves to lie down and relax.

I know that your fees are very low compared with other nursery schools, but it must still be very difficult for some of the parents to pay.
Even for the average Gambian, any school fees are expensive. 300 dalasis a term is a lot for the average Gambian.
In English money, that is about £6 and that is per term.
Yes, but other nursery schools often charge 500 dalasis in Bakau. One even charges 850 per term and in Bakau New Town one charges 1,200 per term.
My main problem at the moment is the structure. Once the structure is up we can get going. But running costs are expensive, I am paying the untrained teachers 800 dalasis per month and the trained ones 1,100 per month and that money soon goes. 500 dalasi for a bag of rice and the rest on other food and it is gone. That is why I am looking for sponsorship.

Are some children here sponsored by European visitors?
We have ten that are sponsored by some friends in Kent. A Danish person is sponsoring one child here, another by Swedish people and now you. That is why when visitors come to the school, I am tempted to ask for sponsorship because it make things a bit easier for me and for the parents. Most of the parents are very poor. They cannot afford to send their children to school. As a result, children from the age of 3 to 6 or 7 are left at home. Then at the age of 7 when they enter the government schools, that time, those young years, have been wasted.

And there is so much of the socialisation of children at that age that has to go hand in hand with the learning. The children who have had a good nursery education are at an enormous advantage when it comes to entering junior schools
Their performance cannot be compared. Some have not learned even to count whilst others of the same age are writing. All the things about sorting, building structures, naming shapes and objects, whilst the others have not even started.

" width="400" height="300" border="1" color="purple" align="left" class="photoleft"> Then there's the teaching which is all in English and not in the local languages.
There's a great advantage to those who have already been taught in English.

In the Gambia there are, what is it, six different ethnic languages?
There's Wolof, Mandinka, Jolof, Fula, Serer and a number of languages spoken by smaller numbers of immigrant groups; people that have come to The Gambia as refugees from conflicts in other parts of Africa.
You know, looking at the map, The Gambia is entirely sandwiched by Senegal, except for the Atlantic Ocean on this side and it is a peaceful country and that draws the attention of a lot of people. I ask myself why we are so peaceful; is it because we are obedient? Is it because we are passive? Why are The Gambians so peaceful?
The Gambia was colonised by Great Britain. Senegal was colonised by the French and that means that our attitudes are different….
(A loud cracking noise in the tree above us)
Now you are experiencing what the children do…. And when it is windy, there is sand and dust being blown around. The children cannot concentrate… We are trying… but God is coming, I am feeling that. If God will have mercy on the children, God will also have mercy on us. And if God has mercy on us, we will surely find the funding. That is the inspiration that I give my teachers. I tell them that. Then they ask, "When is God coming?" and I say, "We just have to wait! He'll find us here."
When I was in Bakau New Town, I did a lot of structures there. The British High Commission helped build one block. The American Embassy helped build another block. We have Friends of Gambian Schools - FROGS - an institution based in Kent. They helped to restore the old buildings we had. Then I decided to put up a three classroom block. In fact, if you go to that school, the block is named after me now. Now when I started that block, the Minister of Education came to me and said, "Are you a head or a building contractor?" But the minister was there. Every parent in Bakau wanted their child to come to Bakau New Town School because they believed that we were the best! They believed that their children would get to senior school. The number of passes we had compared to the number of passes that other schools would have then people were interested in sending their children there. So we had 34 classes. We had 2,000 plus children so where were we going to put them? The minister said "double shifts." We teach in the morning up until 2 o'clock then we continue with a new set of children would come and then we would teach them. It was taking its toll on our lives! I decided that we needed more structures, so what we did was to fund raise… did a sponsored walk then we bought the cement and sand and we started. With all those children we were able to do many activities like your "Bob-a Job" except it was a dalasi-a-job. We organised the children as well as the teachers. We went round, we did cleaning jobs and we raised money. We asked the children to do sponsored walks and they were able to raise funds. These children were all young so there were many activities you could not do with them. We cooked lunches in the school and sold them to the children and with that money we started and we were on our way. Then we had tourists come to visit the school, from England, We had a company of businessmen, they brought us footballs and football boots for the children so I took them round the school and I showed them the structure. They said they were going to help. What they did was find what we needed - roofing, corrugated iron sheets, nails. They went and they brought us all those things. They went back to England and sent us some more money. This was how the building was completed. We invited the minister, the parents, and the police band. There were cultural dances - it was just wonderful. It was a great day; one of the happiest days in my life.
The structure was opened there were three classrooms and we had three classrooms opened and there were very happy children. Even that joy alone is enough to take you to paradise. When I was retiring, they made a plaque, and they named the block after me and I had to unveil the plaque on my retirement. I was ushered to the block. They had the ribbons tied. The Minister of Education, the Imam, dignitaries were all there and they took lots of photos. It was a day that I will never forget in my life. For the 35 years that I have taught, I think that that was the happiest day of my career.
I unveiled it, to see that the block was named after me. I was very proud. Then they named all the other blocks after the people, organisations that had raised the funds to recognise their contributions.

You have achieved an enormous amount in your teaching career; and at the same time you have brought up a large family.
I have eight children; I am blessed with four boys and four girls. My first son was born on Valentine's Day in 1966, a year after my qualification. In 1968, I had my second son, in 1970, my first girl… going through until 1986 when I had my last girl. I must confess that I am very grateful to God. I have devoted all my life caring for other people's children and God has devoted time to me by giving me my lovely children. They are all doing well; all went on to higher education, living in Germany, England and as well as here in The Gambia. I have a very good husband, a perfect gentleman. He was also a teacher and he was the registrar at the Gambia College. He qualified in England in Newcastle-on-Tyne. He went back to Newcastle to do his master's degree. He is nicknamed "British Boy"! I am very lucky to be married to him; I only hope all my children will be as happy as I am.