Last Friday, we spent the day at the FCC Early Education Center, located in the eastern part of Freetown. The daycare is run by the Freetown City Council and provides free pre-school education to the children of market women who trade at Congo Water Market. The aim is to provide children from low-income families a head start in life. If not for the daycare, most of the children would accompany their mothers at the market, like is so common across Freetown.
Our goal was to gauge how the daycare has impacted the lives of the children's mothers. As part of our work this summer, we are tasked with evaluating the impact of three city programs on women's welfare and livelihoods, and the daycare is one of them. Over the course of the day, we interviewed six mothers with the help of Miss Dingie, the head teacher, who translated for us from krio when needed.
The women all shared a strong conviction about the importance of their children’s education and joy over having the opportunity to send their children to the FCC daycare. Sadly, they also shared great anxiety over what would happen when their child graduated and moved on to primary school. The public school system in Sierra Leone is not of great quality, and since they can't afford private school, they worry that their children will not learn.
They urged us to make the pre-school into a primary school as well, prompting us to explain that we didn't have the power to do so but would pass the message along. When a mother can’t sleep at night because of anxiety over her child’s future, it feels like an unsatisfying answer, to say the least.
In the daycare. Stuti speaks to Miss Dingie, the head teacher.
Life has not been easy for any of the women. Most of them are single parents, often providing not only for their children but also their aging parents. They wake up between 5 and 6AM and work until late at night, struggling to afford food for the home. There are no bank accounts or savings, no safety net when the day’s sales fall short.
One of the mothers told us that she makes breakfast in the morning on the days that she can afford it. On the days that she can’t, she tries to at least make dinner for her and her 5-year-old daughter. Another told us that dinner consisted of tea and bread.
The women shared remarkable resilience and persistence in providing for their children and creating opportunities for them. When asked about the impact of the daycare on themselves, they found it hard to distinguish their own welfare from their children's welfare. When we asked them if they had any past times that they enjoyed, such as watching a movie, they struggled to answer. They seemed to have put their own needs completely aside and were confused as to why we might be interested in them at all.
However, the daycare appears to have brought positive changes to their lives, too. They told us that that they were less stressed now about their children’s safety while while working, since they were in safe hands in the daycare, that they were able to focus more on their businesses, and had greater peace of mind about their child’s development. In the next two weeks, our task will be to systematically analyze the interviews and put forward insights and learnings for the Freetown City Council.
Market women at Congo Water Market.