Scholarships and bursaries make higher education more affordable for any student, but for those students who are striving to escape impoverished conditions, they form a lifeline. This kind of support can help them break generational cycles of poverty and set them up for bright futures by enabling them to complete a degree that will dramatically increase their lifetime earning potential. The Barzilai Foundation is partnering with Education For All Morocco to provide financial support to students with these aspirations.
Education For All Morocco (EFAM) is an organisation dedicated to bringing the transformative power of education to marginalised girls in rural Morocco who face logistical, economic, and social obstacles to quality schooling. Education For All’s largest initiative is a boarding environment that extends safety and stability to girls aged 12-18 as they pursue secondary education.
Through our scholarship program, four students are receiving scholarships and bursaries that cover the cost of tuition and basic housing needs at SIST, Cardiff Metropolitan University’s associate university in Casablanca. The university is amplifying the impact of this program, by reducing these students’ tuition by 50% the program is able to support more students.
Our four recipients, Fatima, Loubna, Khadija, and Loubna, have spent time in the care of EFAM due to financial disadvantage and dangerous living situations. All four have already completed their baccalaureate and were chosen for this award due to their strong academic performance, fluency in English, demonstrated work ethic and a personal statement that illustrated their goals for their time at SIST.
When we visited the young women at the university, they shared how excited they were for this opportunity. Each of them faced some resistance to pursuing higher education, some from family members and others from their village communities. They are dedicated to moving past any doubts or obstacles to complete their education, though, knowing that it will not only change their futures but allow them to lift up their families too.
“These women are motivated and resilient,” said Brandon Sosa, CEO of the Barzilai Foundation. “The entire process, from learning of their need to selecting recipients and notifying them they would be going to university, happened in just a few days. Their lives changed just like that, and hearing first-hand from them what that means, I couldn’t be happier about providing opportunities for these young women.”
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