Carol established a collaborative relationship in 2019 between Teachers College, Columbia University, the Senegalese NGO Association in Research and Education for Development (ARED), and professors and students at the Université Cheikh Anta Diop (UCAD) in Dakar. Our relationship began in 2018 with fieldwork conducted by then-Teachers College Associate Professor Carol Benson, then-PhD student Erina Iwasaki, and Professor Mbacké Diagne of UCAD under a consultancy agreement with U.S.-based Miske Witt and Associates International. This fieldwork contributed to a large-scale evaluation of ARED’s innovative “simultaneous” bilingual education pilot program, which was implemented in Wolof or Pulaar and French in approximately 100 primary schools in five regions of Senegal.

Carol and Erina returned to Senegal along with MA student Jemima Douyon in July/August 2019 to conduct follow-up research on the origins and procedural aspects of the simultaneous bilingual model and on the language activists who call themselves “militants” for the use of national languages in education in Senegal. These MLE advocates became the focus of Erina’s dissertation research:

Iwasaki, Erina (April 2022). National languages, multilingual education, and the self-proclaimed “militants” for change in Senegal. Unpublished PhD dissertation. International and Transcultural Studies, Teachers College, Columbia University.

Since January 2020, Carol, Erina and TC doctoral student Charlotte Caron have worked with ARED to maintain a network of bilingually trained teachers, teacher trainers and inspectors by supporting a WhatsApp group. We have designed and produced a periodic newsletter for this network called “La missive de l'éducation plurilingue au Sénégal,” and plan to publish articles by stakeholders in Senegalese national languages.

Publication:

Benson, C. (2020). An innovative ‘simultaneous’ bilingual approach in Senegal: Promoting interlinguistic transfer while contributing to policy change. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism. Published online June 11, 2020. https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/AWJHKZARQ985MCSZG7GI/full?target=10.1080/13670050.2020.1765968

Contributors/Collaborators:

Carol Benson, Erina Iwasaki, Mbacké Diagne, Jemima Douyon, Charlotte Caron

Teachers College student volunteers who helped with data coding and analysis: Tenzin Arya Sangmo, Alyssa Baylor, Jazz Digao, Casey Gallagher, Woo-Jung Amber Kim, Jane Lee, Gigi Mei, Charlotte Suzara, Honey Walrond, and Jasmine Tintut Williams