2023 Award "Best Practice in Citizen Participation"

Bonconto is a small local authority in Senegal, established as a commune in 2014 with the advent of full decentralization (creation of the Commune). It is located in the department of Vélingara and 12.5 km from the RN6. Capital of the district, Bonconto is mainly populated by Peulh (98%). The population is very young and the standard of living remains very precarious. The main economic activities are agriculture and livestock with secondary activities such as trade, forestry and handicrafts.

It has 17 primary schools with a single high school and one technical professional center. Only three primary schools have a complete cycle. The isolation of certain villages from schools, which polarizes them, combined with poverty, means that the majority of children enter school late. This phenomenon also favors early drop-outs, especially among girls. Based on this observation, the Mayor has launched two initiatives since 2022 to boost the schooling and retention of children in school through:

• providing all students with complete supplies with a bag in support;
• signing of an agreement with the Educhance Group as part of the implementation of an early childhood development project to stem the social inequalities that exist between children of urban and rural origin.

We started from the observation that children who attend preschool have a better chance of succeeding in school. They most often get an age advantage over their peers who are not so lucky. They are also much more likely to pursue advanced studies. It is added that the majority of children often did not have the minimum necessary for the teaching staff to be able to respect the will of the President of the Republic "OUBI TEY JANGUI TEY" due in large part to the poverty of the parents who only count on the sale of their agricultural products to obtain money.

It should also be noted that the Gross Enrollment Rate (TBS) of preschool in the Commune was very alarming compared to other local authorities in the department of Vélingara. On the strength of this observation, the Mayor upon his accession to the head of the City Council undertook to provide all the children of the 17 establishments of the Commune with complete supplies to not only relieve the parents of this burden but also to allow them to be able to start classes as soon as school starts.

The Mayor also relies on the development of early childhood to meet the challenge of the related TBS, while offering the possibility to this category of citizens of the municipality to benefit from their rights to education like children from other localities. see cities. This earned him from the first year the opening of 3 new education centers (2022), then the recruitment of 17 instructors during the current year, including former instructors. He then mobilized the means to train them as educational community monitors in order to prepare them to be better able to supervise young children.