Provide reading opportunities to schoolchildren

Over the past month, the BMP (Bibliotheque Mobile Pénélope,) has been going out five days a week and visiting schools and some other locations, offering young schoolchildren opportunities to read books, do coloring and drawing activities, and work on puzzles. We thought we would share some recent photos from the outings. School is set to resume in Burkina Faso in October. The BMP will then establish a regular schedule to visit schools during lunch and after school hours. One priority for the BMP is to restock with new children's books and more puzzles. FAVL has been lucky in that the current driver and animator of the BMP has promised to continue on for at least another six months.

Libraries and most other public activities in Burkina Faso were closed due to COVID19, in late March 2020. The government in July decided to start reopening, and the office of the mayor of Houndé decided to permit activities to resume. Officially, the pandemic has largely spared Burkina Faso, with only a few thousand cases, total, as of late July. It is impossible to know at present how accurate the official case tallies are.

FAVL-Burkina Faso, in consultation with local authorities, decided to reopen activities in mid-July. Schools remains closed until October. The mobile library first outing was a "practice" run to several schools to let students and teachers in the area know that the mobile library would resume regular visits. In each schools a few children and some teachers were present. In the second week of activity, more students were present.

The mobile library was "re-supplied" with about 60 books for use by young readers. Thanks for your support for the mobile library over the years!

Thanks for your support of this project over the past months. As you might imagine, the COVID-19 virus has been put a hold on most library activities. Libraries in Burkina Faso, Ghana and Uganda have been closed following recommendations of local authorities. One of the last activities done in Burkina Faso was to create a book about COVID-19 and how to prevent the spread of the virus. The book was distributed to the last visit to villages in Tuy province mid-March. Instead of reporting on recent activities, then we have a selection of photos from the last month (February) when libraries were open. We are looking forward to eventual re-opening of libraries as soon as prudent.

In our last report we noted that the security situation in Burkina Faso had worsened and so FAVL was moving the mobile library (BMP, or Bibliothèque Mobile Pénélope) to the town of Houndé. A partnership agreement with the office of the mayor was finally signed in November. $200 worth of new books was purchased at the end of November at the International Ouagadougou Book Fair (FILO), thanks to a generous donor. We had an advertisement for recruiting a librarian/driver, but unfortunately only one person responded and they were not qualified. So we have to continue to try to recruit someone who can begin operations. It is a half-time position (20 hours a week) and many educated young people are constantly looking for full-time, longer term work. So it is hard to recruit successfully. This moving of the library has taken a long time. We are frustrated, and know that donors also are frustrated. Patience, though, is the way to effect some good.

Some brief updates about other library support: The Kitengesa library in Uganda continues to thrive. This year a health reading camp was held for adult women, focusing on women’s cancer. Another reading camp was held for teenagers, and a further women’s reading camp is planned for later in the year. The Kitengesa Library Band continues to practice and perform.

In Burkina Faso, we are currently supporting 34 community libraries. Terrorist activity in northern Burkina Faso unfortunately has meant that four libraries are temporarily closed due to danger (schools and administrative buildings are targets.) For the libraries that are open, we continue to do the best we can to provide regular assistance to mayors and rural councils in managing the libraries, supply select libraries with new books, train librarians, and offer salary support for some of the librarians. Our Burkina team continues to produce photos books for young readers as well as books written by young people and illustrated with local illustrators.

In Ghana, our able partner organization CESRUD and its library coordinator Paul Ayutoliya continue to manage the three libraries of Sumbrungu, Gowrie-Kunkua, and Sherigu. These libraries regularly receive 30 or more visits a day- about 1,000 visits each month. They are open for night reading, as they are now connected to electricity. Donors this year helped fix the fans (it gets to 110 degrees during the day!). After school reading programs were held in September and are planned for this summer. All three libraries received several hundred new books over the course of the year thanks to support from Biblionef Ghana and the Ghana Book Trust.

Updates and lots of photos from all three countries are regularly posted to the FAVL blog

The secruity situation in Burkina Faso has continued to worsen, and so FAVL is planning to bring the mobile library to the town of Houndé, per the previous report on the mobile library project (now called the Bibliothèque Mobile Pénélope). This planning is taking much longer than expected, primarily because the staff at the municipal council are very slow to finalize a partnership agreement. The partnership agreement is necessary for four reasons.

1. First, the mobile library is most effective when it visits schools, during reading time, recess, or immediately after school. That is when most readers are "willing and able" to spend time reading. Access to school yards requires some formal cooperation with the office of the mayor (the municipal council has some authority over schools) and also the regional ministry of education officials.
2. Second, the mobile library is highly visible in the town, and in case there are any "incidents" with the library (accidents, arguments), it is desirable to have the full support of the office of the mayor.
3. Third, for longer-term functioning of the mobile library, the mayor has indicated he would like a town employee to be the *animateur* who operates the mobile library, with FAVL contributing technically and financially. FAVL is in favor of this model!
4. Fourth, and prosaically, the courtyard of the council buildings is the safest place to park the mobile library, since it is always secure and have a night guard. So official permission is needed to park the mobile library there.

While we wait for the office of the mayor and the regional education ministray officials to authorize activities, we are replenishing the book stock of the mobile library, repainting the shelves, and doing regular maintenance on the tricycle. We hope to have the library operating early in the new school year, which starts October 6.