By Roseline Teghtegh, YES 2009-2010, Nigeria, hosted by IRIS in Cedar Falls, IA

My name is Roseline Teghtegh and I am from Benue state in Nigeria. I am an alumna of the Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study (YES) program. I participated in YES from 2009-2010. I stayed in Cedar Falls, Iowa during my exchange year and I had a great time. My YES experience helped me open up to express myself, improved my self-confidence and made me more sensitive to other peoples’ needs, especially the less privileged. 

My city, Makurdi, is the capital of Benue state in Nigeria. It can be considered an administrative and commercial town, with people working in government parastatals and engaging in commercial activities. The beautifully laid out town extends into the outskirts where people engage in agricultural activities. Benue is the food basket of the nation.

When I returned home to Nigeria after completing the YES program, I identified a problem in my community. I discovered that the children at Gidan Bege orphanage in Makurdi had no place to read when they came home from school. The Gidan Bege orphanage has 37 kids residing there. Their ages range from 6 – 18 years old, with about 70% falling within the ages of 6 - 12. They are in the orphanage for various reasons. Some are there because they were displaced from their homes by internal crisis. Some are there because of family situations like poor backgrounds or too many kids in the family. Some are there because of broken homes, while others are there because they are truly orphaned or were picked up as abandoned babies at birth.

I have visited the orphanage several times, and even though the community collectively takes care of the kids, through visitations, donations and adoptions, I felt that it was time for all of us to take a deeper interest in the educational well-being of the children. There are a lot of kids living in the orphanage, which makes the place rowdy and noisy. I decided to set up a library at the orphanage so that the kids could have a place to study that would be conducive to doing their homework.

I applied to the YES Alumni Grant Awards program through American Councils for International Education and was awarded funding for my project. My fellow alumni from Benue state and I set out to set up a library. The first thing we did was conduct a book drive around the community to gather books that will go into the library. We went to schools and asked the pupils and parents to donate to our cause. We also met Ministry of Education officials and other individuals. Among the people that helped in the project by way of assisting in the book drive were some religious youth groups, Peniel Nigera, a Christian association, and the Muslim Student Society of Nigeria (MSSN). They invited us to their schools to conduct the book drive and also contributed books.

The book drive was able to gather about a thousand books of different disciplines. We collected only English books because of the language diversity in Nigeria. The kids in the orphanage learn English language at school. There are math, English and literary, science and technology, social and civic education, business and vocation texts. In addition, there are a number of activity books in English and mathematics.

After the book drive, we painted the room that was to become the library at the orphanage. We got bookshelves, reading tables and chairs for the library. We also got a computer system for the library. After all of this, the alumni gathered to sort out and arrange the books onto the shelves, and we decorated the library with write-ups and pictures. We had an opening ceremony where we commissioned the library. The event was covered by the state radio, Radio Benue.

The library was set up for the residents of the Gidan Bege orphanage home; however, community members can also use it if they make arrangements with the orphanage’s management. The community played a key role in raising the library; it’s ours. Apart from the libraries available in schools around Makurdi, we also have a state library, a very big one I must say, and also a federal library.

The outcome of the project is very encouraging. The residents and management are indeed thankful, and the community is proud and happy that they were able to contribute. My teammate and fellow alumna, Ori Ogbu, said that it was a worthy project that's effects will be felt for a long time afterwards and that she enjoyed working on it. The director of the orphanage, Mr. David Audu, said that this was a challenge for him and for the community at large, and that if the youth could undertake and carry out a task of selflessness for the sake of others, then there is hope for the future. After the program was aired on the Radio Benue, I got a lot of calls from friends and acquaintances commending me. It really felt good.

My hope is that the community will continue to bring books and studying materials as often as they can so that we can all see this library grow. I intend to follow up on this project by checking up on the academic performances of the kids before and after the project. I am very positive that there will be marked improvement.

I absolutely loved working on this project. It helped me do something that I am passionate about, which is helping the less privileged, and it brought me closer to my community and my teammates. My teammates were amazing. They helped out wherever it was needed and showed their commitment until the end. I am glad that we did it together and I’m hoping that we will do more together. The project also served as an awareness campaign to the community about the YES program, regarding who we are and what we do.

I want to end by acknowledging the YES program, the State Department, the YES program national coordinator at IRIS Nigeria, Dr. Saidu Yakubu, my fellow YES alumni from Benue state, American Councils, and everyone who contributed to the success of this project. Thank you all very much.