The Causes community earns $100,000 to educate girls in Malawi

How did the Causes community earn $100,000 to educate girls in Malawi? Simply by watching a short video and inviting their friends to do the same. That’s it. No credit cards, no cash. Join My Village is donating $1 to CARE for every person who views the video. As a community manager by trade, I’m impressed by the difference this collective action will make in the lives of people we will likely never meet.

Because we reached our first goal so quickly, Join My Village is raising the goal to $250,000!

In Malawi, the cost of educating a girl is about $50 per year to cover books, the teacher, the classroom etc. If 250,000 people watch this video, 5,000 girls in Malawi will be able to go to school for a year. We’re just asking for a couple minutes of your time to make this happen.

Can you help us get to 250,000 viewers? I bet you can – if you haven’t watched the video yet, please do so! If you have, please invite your friends to do the same: http://www.causes.com/campaigns/157621?ref=fan

This campaign is a simple way for anyone with a couple minutes to make a lasting impact on a girl in one of the poorest countries in the world. UNESCO’s 2005 Education For All monitoring report, only 31% of adult women can read and write in Malawi. This is shocking when compared to men – 80% of whom are literate. By comparison, according to the CIA’s World Factbook, 99% of women in the United States are considered literate (by definition, can read or write by the age of 15).

Once educated, a girl child is more capable of helping the greater family as she is the one that spends more time with them and so can act as a good mentor. An educated girl can easily manage to start a small business that can help the family financially. It is only through education that girls can learn to be independent and free from male dominance. With education, a girl can easily protect herself from diseases and unwanted pregnancies and is more likely to delay marriage. There is a saying that says, ‘educating a girl is educating the nation’ and this is what Join My Village is all about.

Join My Village is working with CARE to provide reference materials to primary schools as one way of improving girls’ access to education early. The project is also constructing female teachers’ houses in 15 primary schools to encourage more female teachers to move to these schools. The teachers will be role models to girls and also motivate them to aspire for a better future. Join My Village is also providing secondary school scholarships for girls from poor households to keep them in school.

Why Malawi?

JMV wants to end poverty all over the globe, starting in Africa. Malawi is one of the world’s least developed and most densely populated countries.

80:1: the pupil to teacher ratio in primary schools in Malawi

Only 20% of the upper secondary teachers are women

5.7: the average number of children a woman in Malawi has

Only 31% of women are literate, compared to 80% of men