What girls in Malawi gain – and give up – by choosing education
In July 2005, I traveled a thoroughfare in Lilongwe, Malawi, past chicken farms, and then took dirt roads into Bowa village. Our SUV rocked side to side over the pocked roads, constantly sending my hand up to the grab bar. We passed pairs of schoolgirls in blue dresses that brightened the landscape of earth and sky.
Malawi is a largely rural country in southeastern Africa, known for rich traditions, strong community ties, and natural beauty. The economy is growing, and life expectancy has leaped over the past two decades to over 65 years. Still, more than half of its roughly 20 million people live in poverty. Yet despite facing challenges, Malawi is affectionately known as “the warm heart of Africa.”
That summer I was an intern with CARE, a global organization fighting poverty and injustice. I was evaluating the impact of CARE programs in villages like Bowa. There, I met Selina and Anesi Bonefesi. Their story changed my life and many others.
An entrepreneurial farmer, Selina talked right into me, as if we didn’t need a translator. With a loan from CARE, she’d started a business selling tasty bites of fried dough to passersby. The income was a welcome supplement to what she and her husband earned from growing tobacco. Still, they did not make enough to pay the $200 needed for Selina’s 14-year-old stepdaughter, Anesi, to finish primary school.
With an expected household income of $463 that year, they had prioritized their son in 11th grade, whom they deemed more likely to find employment.
Then, one day after returning to Lilongwe from one of the villages, I got an unexpected call from The Christian Science Monitor. The editors wanted an article about a family in Africa living on less than $1 a day per person, a figure widely used to signal poverty. It would run during the G8 summit in Scotland, where world leaders ultimately decided to forgive billions of dollars of international debt for countries
