I Ran Away From Home To Get An Education And To Avoid Getting Married At 16 - Raquel Kasham Daniel, Founder of Bambini Africa.

As part of our ongoing series for International Women's Day in March, I chatted with Raquel Kasham Daniel, the founder of Beyond the Classroom Foundation, a non-profit that supports children in impoverished communities by ensuring they enrol, remain, succeed, and graduate from primary school. She is also the owner of Bambini Africa, a humanitarian organisation that develops educational materials for kids. If you work with kids, have kids, or are just curious about kids' education, you'll enjoy this interview.

Her story may move you to tears, but it also teaches us that a happy ending is possible if you put in the effort.

Here’s how the interview went:

Can you introduce yourself, please?

My name is Raquel Kasham Daniel. I’m from Kaduna State, but I grew up in many places, and I was born in Lagos State. When I was about 9 years old, my dad kept saying that we had to move to Kaduna so that my two brothers and I could get familiar with the North and learn about where we’re from.

My dad was very passionate about education, as was my mother, but I never knew why. He would talk about me going to school, graduating, and going to a university.

I had to move back to Lagos not because I wanted to but because my dad died and my uncle decided that, at 16, I should be married off to get some money and put my brothers back in school. So I ran away from home.

If I had gotten married, that would have been the end of it, so I ran away and went back to Lagos, where I thought I knew, but it was a shocker because I had to live on the streets for almost 2 years.

I was about to ask if you knew anyone in Lagos at the time.

I was 9 going to 10 when we left Lagos, so I didn’t really know much, but my uncle was there, so I stayed with him for a while, and then I left because of an attempted rape. It was horrible. I had to live on the streets in Obalende for about 2 years. When I was about 19, my mom passed away, so I had to go back to take care of my brothers - 3 of them. I gave you that background so that you’ll understand my answers when you ask me certain questions about my work, like why I do what I do. People are used to seeing the glamorous life and winning awards, but it all started somewhere.

When I was 19, I had to take my brother in, and life continued like that, but I didn’t forget my dream of wanting to go to school because it was my dad’s vision before it became mine. Every year, I kept applying to schools. I would pass JAMB and get into UNILAG, but I wouldn’t be able to go because I had no money, but I needed to always take the exam to remind me of my vision.

People would ask me to stop taking JAMB exams because I’d take them every year; I just had faith. After taking the JAMB exams 4 times, I was able to accept my 5th admission to UNILAG for Educational Administration because I really wanted to be a teacher. I felt that being an educator would help me connect more and help other people. I eventually studied Christian Religious Education and successfully graduated, but it was a long journey, having to manage myself and my brothers on my own.

How did you manage to finish your secondary school education, get money to apply for JAMB, and take care of your brothers?

I had turned 16; my dad died a few weeks after, so I struggled to finish WAEC and everything else. By the time I finished WAEC, my mom couldn’t pay anyone’s school fees anymore, so my brothers dropped out of school. I was the only one who had completed secondary school; my brothers were still in school, so my uncle suggested that I be married off so that the boys could return to school. I was 16 when I left Kaduna, and almost 19 when she passed. She passed before my 19th birthday. I was 16 when I got to my uncle’s house in Lagos, so the attempted rape was by another uncle of mine from my maternal side who was living with us at the time, not the one that suggested that I be married off. Everything seemed to be against me at the time.

I lived in a brothel in Lagos for almost two years. The reason they allowed me to live there in Obalende was that I was a cleaner, and they wanted me to clean, wash their clothes, and cook for them. That was my work. I clean very well. 😄😄😄

I lived with these girls who had clothes and would go to the club. I only had a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. I was working for them for free just so that I could have free accommodation. I then started my first business selling zobo and chinchin while I was there. I started it with N200 😄

Wow, you can’t try that now in current Nigeria 😄😄

No way, 😄.
It’s terrible. So I used N200 to start the business, and it was easy because a jar of Zobo cost about N75. It was affordable. I bought N60 sugar and got water; that’s how it started. My mom used to have a children’s club, so she made me learn these things because she had to make them for free for the children. That’s how I was able to make money until I gathered enough money to leave the streets. I got a job cleaning one of the Asian embassies in Ikoyi. I became the janitor there for a while and I used the money to feed my brothers and me. I was earning N18,000 then.

That must have been hard.

From what you’ve said, you seem like a strong and determined person.

Let’s talk about Bambini books. How did you start, and when did you start?

So, it’s Bambini Africa because Bambini Books is a subsidiary of Bambini Africa.

Oh, okay. So what does Bambini Africa do?

I’ve run a non-profit for 12 years called Beyond The Classroom Foundation, and when I founded it, the goal was simple. We were enrolling kids and making sure they returned to government schools because they were affordable at the time and it was simple to persuade their parents to listen to me after I told them my story and enrol them back in school because education changed my life, and if it did, I could help other people get access to it.

There were a few things we were doing. One of them was to help them get enrolled, help them stay in school, and help them graduate. We helped them excel in school and also participate in extra-curricular activities. That’s part of the programs we created to help children graduate from primary school. That’s what we’ve done for 12 years.

In the course of doing this, I realized that it was difficult to teach children reading and writing. We had to get them resources, but they were expensive, so I started to look within.

When there’s a problem around you and you feel a sense of urgency or need to solve it, the solution might just be in your hands. I thought about what I could do to solve this problem. I thought of creating worksheets that could help them, but I never did. Then came COVID, which helped me start Bambini Africa. I didn’t have a choice but to create the worksheets that I had procrastinated on for many years. So I created a worksheet and put them into different categories, printed copies, and gave them to the kids, and the kids loved them.

In the middle of COVID, we got funders who were asking how they could help the children we work with. At the time, the kids were at home, so I said that if they could pay for the worksheet, more could be printed and given to the children at home. That’s how, right in my room, I thought of how I could create educational materials for children that are affordable, beautiful, and attractive. It started with just worksheets, and then I went into colouring books, tracing books, and drawing books. I then released my first book, which was independently published.

Wow that's amazing

So Bambini Books consists of all the literature, texts, branded exercise books, worksheets, and other books that I’ve written. They are developed into animated series for children in different areas, from safety to hygiene to understanding your country.

I want African children to see representations of themselves in Bambini Books. In all our books, you’ll see African kids, African names, keke napep, and other things that they can relate to. While we were doing that, we realized that we had another opportunity to create board games that children love. We tested it, and it was amazing. So there are three subsidiaries under Bambini Africa, but the goal is to create educational resources that are affordable and accessible to children. Our goal is to get it to those who can’t afford it.

That’s great

Can you run us through your process of planning up until execution for your books and outreach?

Okay, I have a few steps to take. The first step for me is to look around and find out the areas in the lives of children that I want to impact. For Bambini Africa, I wanted to create resources that affected every area of the lives of children. I’ll give an example. The area I’m looking into right now is malaria. So it’ll talk about its relation to the rainy season, how female mosquitoes transmit malaria to humans, and other things. A lot of them don’t have this information. We can now write a children's book around that.

So I look around and even ask the children questions. I work with children at IDP camps and government schools, so I do surveys and ask them questions. That is what informs my choice of my next book.

My first step is to write the book, not to look for someone to pay for it.

The second step is to sit down and create the book. What do I want to see in the book? Then how do I want the story to be? Will it be a storybook or someone narrating the book to the children? What age group do I want to write for? All these will help me write the book. Sometimes it takes about 2 weeks, sometimes 3 days, sometimes 7 days, and I can write an entire story.

Writing the book is the next step. Then I go over and over the book, and I don’t do it all by myself. I get random children to read the draft, and they give me their feedback. When I get the feedback, I implement it all and finish the book. I then figure out the kind of images I want them to see in the book.

While that is being done, I send the book to the editor, who will structure it well. I visualize what I want them to see, and by the time I’m done with that, the editor is probably already done. It then goes to an illustrator. I make use of a couple of them. They sketch the characters and depending on how big the book is, it could take a while for the illustrations to be completed. That is when I start looking for funders. I can’t print it myself because it’s quite expensive. If I were to print it, it would cost me so much. I’d probably have to start singing and dancing on social media asking people to buy the books, which is not what I want to do with my life. 😄😄😄

I look for people who are passionate about children and can afford to sponsor the books so that we can get them to the children that need them. I do research and send out emails and proposals telling them that I’m trying to educate children on handwashing or safety, and I have a book that’s coming out soon.

I then provide them with the cost of the book so their company can sponsor it. I send emails, and I send DMs on social media. About 50% of the people I send messages to will reply. If it means waking up early every morning or staying up at night to send those emails, I’ll do it.

I saw that on your social media. You just completed a renovation for a handwashing station in a school.

Yes.

So when a funder sees that I’m not just giving children books but that I’m creating an entire system for the kids to practice what they learn, they become more interested.

We teach them how to make liquid soap too, so they have soap to wash their hands, water in the school, and a book. We target behaviour change, so it's easy for funders to get in on the project.

When we come up with these projects, we’re not just asking them to fund them; we’re asking them to join us on the journey of creating behavioural change in the children and helping them learn because when we give the kids the storybooks, colouring books, tracing books, and worksheets, they learn, and at the end of the term, you’ll find out that they can do these activities by themselves. We’ve seen it happen with the worksheets we provide. That’s how I invite funders. We then implement the project and move on to the next thing.

That sounds great.

Do you usually follow up on the children to find out their progress after visiting the schools and giving them the books? Do you go back to monitor the projects? For example, after the handwashing station renovation that you just did, do you have plans to go back to the school to see if the children are even using it and if it’s being managed well?

We have the M&E (monitoring and evaluation) process, and it always comes up in every project to measure and evaluate the work that has been done to determine if what was planned was done and if it works.

We have a few Corpers in schools that help us monitor ongoing projects. They can provide us with feedback that is unbiased and honest. From time to time, they forward pictures to us of pupils using the facilities, like washing their hands before returning to their classrooms.

We also have a small proportion of the students fill out a survey before project implementation. A while after implementation, we have the same students fill out another survey, and we usually see that there's been a change through the impact of the books, the lessons, and the project because they now understand better what we’re trying to say. We typically give it a maximum of 4 weeks before going back. We can’t close a project without measuring and evaluating it. If we see that a project wasn’t done well, we make changes to the next project or the next school.

That’s great.

Have you faced any challenges so far in the course of your work?

Working in the development space is rewarding, but not without its challenges. For me, the challenges I face are monetary, manpower-related, and partnership-related (private and government).

I’ll start with the monetary challenges. I can’t just print 10,000 books by myself; I don’t have that kind of money, you know, so someone has to fund it. Even if I had a fantastic idea to get children a board game, it would cost about N12,000 to print just one board game, so someone would have to fund it. Sometimes the best ideas are there, but funding is an issue. So we rely greatly on grants and any financial support that anyone can give us.

The second one is manpower. Volunteers come and go. We don’t have a lot of money, so we are not able to pay as much as big organizations can. People leave almost every year, and I understand. They come here to begin their journey.

The third is partnerships. Partnerships don’t have to be monetary. For instance, I reached out to a lot of non-profit organizations during our safety project.

They typically ask what’s in it for them and their organization, but I ask that we, first of all, come to an understanding of what the project is about before we start discussing how much money is in it for them, and I hear that a lot. Partnerships can be difficult when the first question they ask is how much money I have secured and how much I will contribute to their organization.

Government partnerships can be hard to secure because of the amount of time it takes for them to respond. For one of our health projects, they kept saying they’d get back to us over and over again. We started the project, and before they got back to us, the project was over. We don’t want money from them; we just want some sort of backing and recognition, which gives us more credibility.

Those are my top three challenges.

One other thing is family. You know how it is for women.

Yes, I was about to come to that 😄

How do you manage the work you do and your family? It is a lot of work and takes a lot of time. I’ve worked with an NGO before, and I know how time-consuming it can be.

Do you think being a woman somehow affects your work? Does it affect how far and how fast you grow?

For me, being a woman or being married hasn’t affected how far and how fast I go in any way. I tell young women a lot that the decision about who to marry is very important. That person has to understand your work as much as you understand theirs because it becomes a partnership once you get married.

For the newly married, it’s okay to take a break from work and understand this new life that you have, especially if you just had a baby. Some women can resume work after 1 month of giving birth, but it’s okay if you resume after 5 months as long as what you’re doing during that time is productive, like taking care of your children. Some are in such a hurry to get back to work that they dump their 3-month-old or even 3-week-old baby at the creche and ask the security man to hold the baby until the creche opens. These children get molested sometimes, and the children become fractured in society. So you end up doing more harm than good.

That’s so inspiring 😄😄

Thank you very much for that.

What advice do you have for young people who are trying to start a non-profit organization like yours?

What I’ll tell anyone who wants to start a nonprofit is that you don’t have to start one. You can volunteer. There are so many people doing things, and you can chip in. Volunteer, learn, and see if it’s something you want to do so that you’re not just starting and stopping. Running a non-profit is very difficult, and you need money. So don’t leave your full-time job to start a nonprofit. You’re going to starve 😄 or you’ll start begging for money on social media, and when you get donations, you’ll spend it, but that’s not what you want to do with your life. Don’t leave your job to start a nonprofit. You can have both.

Join the right network. There are so many of them, like YALI and others. When you join communities of people doing social change work, it will help you to clarify and simplify what you want to do because a lot of people who operate non-profits are trying to solve all the problems of the world.

Amazing and useful advice. Thank you.

When you’re not working or taking care of the family, what do you do for fun?

Hmm, I do work for fun.

😄😄

Yes. I do light work. I do research for fun. I enjoy it. People say that I work non-stop, but that’s not the case. I may decide to learn how to design a book cover. It’s leisure for me because I’m not under pressure to turn in a report or on the clock to deliver. When I’m learning a new skill, I don’t see it as work. I also love to sleep. If I’m awake at night, it’s because I slept during the day. I watch a lot of movies too.

Can you share your social media handles with people who want to connect with you or want you to mentor them? Also, how can people donate to your organization?

We are on Instagram: @btheclassroom and our Website is: https://btheclassroom.org/

My personal Instagram handle is @theraqueldaniel and my website is https://raqueldaniel.com/

You can contact us via any of those channels for details on current projects and how you can participate in them, support them, volunteer for them, or help us connect with sponsors, funders, and organisations that are enthusiastic about the work we do.

Thank you so much for your time, Raquel.

Any time. Thank you for having me.

I hope reading this encourages you to keep trying. You only need to keep working towards your goals. Your aspirations are real.

Keep an eye out for our next IWD interview.