BWEF Partners
BWEF works with many local partners in Burkina Faso, some who have been part of BWEF since the beginning, others who joined more recently. All of them help implement BWEF's mission and support the BWEF beneficiaries. Meet BWEF's partners below:
Christiane Toé
BWEF anchor in Ouagadougou
Christiane is our anchor in Ouagadougou. She is a managing consultant and gives her time free to BWEF, writing checks, balancing the books, and sending us monthly reports and bank statements. She keeps an eye on the girls and arranges meetings for them to get to know each other and help each other out.
Mariam Savadogo
Representative of Chance For Change in Burkina Faso, BWEF’s US affiliate
Mariam is an accountant by profession and a founding member of an association of Burkina university women set up by Christiane Toé three decades ago. She is now President of our new affiliate in Burkina Faso, BWEF Faso.
Père Albert Kabore
Founder of Solidarité Goëlo Burkina in Koudougou
It all started with Solidarité Goëlo Burkina, an NGO founded in 2000 by Gilberte Saint Cast in France and Père Albert Kaboré in Burkina Faso. They have helped about 45 girls a year through secondary school. Since 2010, BWEF have given a grant to each of Solidarité’s beneficiaries who passed their baccalaureate exam (and even some who didn’t) to go on to higher education.
Catherine Yameogo
President of Solidarity Goëlo-Burkina
Catherine Yameogo has been President of the Burkina Faso branch of Solidarité Goëlo-Burkina for nearly 25 years. As a former schools inspector, she comes in touch with students regularly and recommends them for financial support at the secondary school level.
Christine Gnoumou
Only salaried BWEF employee in Ouagadougou
Christine works full-time as Christiane’s assistant in Ouagadougou. With a degree in accounting and human resource management, she manages the administration and accounts under Christiane’s supervision. Christine is the BWEF students’ first point of contact and is regularly in touch with them to follow up with their lives and needs. She also organizes workshops, such as about sexual health as well as computer skills.
Dr. Traoré
Director of the BWEF Health Fund
With a 6,000 CHF grant from the UN Women’s Guild in Geneva, we established a Health Fund to cover all medical costs for our beneficiaries. Dr. Etienne Traoré headed the fund on a volunteer basis, describing his role as “in charge of the fight against disease”. In 2023, he withdrew as Director for health reasons and was replaced by Djénéba Ouedraogo, who is director of a health clinic in Ouagadougou.
Djénéba Ouedraogo
BWEF Representative in Ouagadougou
Djénéba was introduced to us by her sister, who is a member of our Board. She worked for an organization that has health clinics in all three cities where our young women study—Ouagadougou, Koudougou and Bobo Dioulasso. There are doctors, gynaecologists and nurses on duty, a one-stop shopping for health care. Our Health Fund will reimburse all costs.
Michel Komi
BWEF Representative in Koudougou
Michel is a male nurse, expert in health security in the workplace and works for the Office of Workers’ Health. Michel represents our Health Fund in Koudougou.
Noëlie Tapsoba
Our Representative in Koudougou
Noëlie is the director of a dressmaking school with 35 students, which we partially subsidize.
Abdoulaye Bamba
BWEF Photographer in Burkina Faso
Abdoulaye took photos for BWEF as an amateur and we noticed he had a good eye. We sent him for professional photography training to the Imagine Institute in Ouagadougou and bought him a nice Canon camera. Now he's our official BWEF photographer.
Boubié Reyidara Nebié
Soccer coach of the BWEF team in Ouagadougou
Boubié trains our BWEF girls’ soccer team. The brother-in-law of Brigitte, one of our former beneficiaries, Boubié coached a boys’ soccer club aiming to keep the kids in school. Fred challenged him to start a girls’ team and said BWEF would support him. He did so immediately. He is also a policeman, coach of the police soccer team and is studying to be certified as a coach.
David Gouhier
Computer technician for the Rennes school district in France.
David, a computer technician with the Rennes School District, cleans the used laptops, repairs them if necessary and gives them to the BWEF students. Thanks to him, virtually every young woman helped by BWEF has a laptop.