Overcoming Odds: Empowering Disabled Youth with Creativity

Join us on AXSChat as we sit down with the inspiring Praise Akobo, a Programme Associate and Disability Advocate from Abuja, Nigeria. Praise's personal journey as a person with a disability who overcame immense odds to pursue education is nothing short of remarkable. She shares her impactful work with Yield Up Development Initiative, where innovative educational programs are combating bullying and discrimination in Benue State. Praise also talks about her work with the Dogalov Human Support Initiative, which employs animal-assisted services to aid children with disabilities. This episode is a testament to how creative activities and local resources can foster a nurturing and inclusive learning environment.

We also explore the power of community-driven solutions and the significance of understanding local contexts in fostering disability inclusion. Praise recounts a touching story of assisting a young girl facing challenges similar to those she encountered in her youth, highlighting the transformative potential of localized efforts. Her experiences with international opportunities, such as the Mandela Washington Fellowship, underscore the value of adapting global insights to local challenges. Finally, Praise discusses the contributions of social networks in raising disability awareness, blending local insights with international practices, and the ongoing battle against cultural stigmas. This episode is a must-listen for anyone passionate about creating inclusive, resilient communities.

Chapters

• 0:01 Disability Advocacy and Creative Solutions
• 10:57 Empowering Communities to Co-Create Solutions
• 20:55 Impact of International Social Networks

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:01

Hello and welcome to Access Chat. I'm delighted that we're joined today by Praise Okobo. She's joining us from Abuja, nigeria. Great to have you with us, praise. Praise is a Programme Associate and Disability Advocate. She works with two initiatives Yield Up, which is a development initiative, and Dougalove, which is a human support initiative. Prez, great to have you with us. Can you tell us a bit about the work that you're doing and a bit more about yourself and how you came to be working in this field?

Speaker 2: 0:37

All right, thank you, neil. Thank you very much. So thank you for the introduction. You've already mentioned my name, so I'm Pre Akobu and I'm a disability inclusion advocate. I work with Dogalo Women's Support Initiative as the program's associate and I co-founded Yield of Development Initiative. So I'm going to quickly speak about the both. So at Yield of Development Initiative, our work is to build leaders, especially persons with disabilities to.

Speaker 2: 1:11

Benue State, nigeria, which is the north central part of Nigeria, were out of school as a result of some sort of bullying or discrimination. So we decided to see how we could cope with that challenge and also solve the literacy gap that challenge and also solve the literacy gap. So what we did was we began to visit the communities. So we began to have a center, so it was more like an open center of learning. So we first of all identified each child's disability so that we can tailor our program to fit into their disability interest. So let's say, if it's a child with autism, that would help us really understand how to tailor our curriculum. Also, what we did was that we ensured that their interest was looked out for first. For instance, for a child who has been out of school for a while, it may be difficult to immediately introduce this child to school education, so we brought in creative activities to foster learning and we utilized our local resources to do this. So local resources means stuff like discarded plastic bottles to teach them how to make creative pieces like flower vests, pencil vests. So this is like an entry point for what we do and why at Dogalove Women's Support Initiative we incorporate animal assisted services, which is like an intervention that supports persons with disabilities. So we try to see that we understand also this child's challenge and be able to tailor.

Speaker 2: 3:28

But aside all of this, I'm a person with lived experience of disability, so you may wonder why my interest is around disability inclusion. So I also had that experience and I was always told to either stay out of school or defer. So I continued because I knew that if I'm able to beat this, I was going to be able to support other children with disabilities. And that was also what sponsored my study in veterinary medicine, because veterinary medicine, if you know, can be quite tedious and taxing. But then I pushed and today I'm a veterinary doctor.

Speaker 1: 4:07

So through veterinary medicine I can also tailor my experiences to supporting children with disabilities, which I'm fascinated by the fact that you are so motivated. But also I fully understand the personal reasons behind it. Personal reasons behind it, um, but you were discouraged from continuing your education, but you, you saw the worth in doing so. You went and graduated. You're a vet now. So you're role modeling, right. You're a role model for the, the kids that are going through the programs, and I think that that's that's hugely important because you can give them the um, the, the reassurance that you know they carry on and they, then they or they return to education. Then there are, you know, real career prospects for them. I think that that's super.

Speaker 1: 5:17

I'm I'm really interested in the, the whole sort of creativity side of things because, as someone that has, you know, is neurodivergent and was told that I was a daydreamer and and that I, you know, I should maybe not do certain things at school and discouraged from other things, it was the creativity and the things that interested me that kept me going in in academia. So I think that the approach of finding the interest and the creativity is really important. How do you do that? Do you have a team of people working and teaching the creative skills, or are you giving the kids the free reign to sort of um, be fully, you know, you know imaginative it. Tell me a little bit more about you know that that whole program?

Speaker 2: 6:18

it sounds fascinating okay, all right, that's fine. So, um, yes, I, I began doing this when I discovered this need, but I knew that I couldn't do it alone. So, cast back to three years ago, I was still an undergraduate, so I began to speak to people, especially in my department. I started with my department to speak to people about my interests and we began to form a team, and that's how Yield Up Development Initiative actually came into existence. So we have currently we have five core leaders and we have 15 volunteers in different. So in Nigeria, we have six geopolitical zones. So this 15 volunteers are currently represented in the geopolitical zones in Nigeria.

Speaker 2: 7:12

This is because we want to begin to expand the work that we do, especially bringing the old creative pieces. So we have to train persons who understood how to create stuff from discarded materials and all of that. We began to bring in professionals yes, people who had worked with the non-disabled community, but then we now had to train them to understand how to handle persons with disabilities, specifically children in this case. So that's really helped us and the volunteers to learn more.

Speaker 2: 8:06

Why still give back? Learn more while still give back? So at the moment, I would say that all of the creative pieces has been something that has been really helpful to us because, just like I said before, some of the kids, they are not really interested in academics full hand, so but then when we brought in the fun activities, the whole creativity involved. So at the moment we are bringing in sports, which is chess, to the library, which I believe I'll still have the opportunity to talk about that. But then we're also bringing other creative aspects aside the plastic bottles which we created for them to be able to create something useful and creative from it.

Speaker 3: 8:54

Praise, thank you so much for joining us today. We were really excited about featuring your work. I want to shift it a little bit to talk about why do you think, praise, as a woman with lived experiences with disabilities that lives in Nigeria, why do you think it's important that we address these issues locally? Because I saw a trend, and still see a bit of a trend of you know people coming from other countries, for example, to tell Nigeria what youall should be doing to improve the quality of your lives and the lives of people all over Nigeria, but certainly from the perspective of trying to help society understand the value of you know us humans that have disabilities.

Speaker 3: 9:45

But why, praise? Do you think it's so important that people like you try to solve the problems that you're seeing in Nigeria, as opposed to the country always bringing in Westerners or people from other countries to say, all right, so what you need to do is do it like we do it here in the United States, for example? I'm just using my beautiful small country as an example. But do you think it's really important, praise, for people that live in Nigeria, that understand the issues in Nigeria, to be really focused on these issues?

Speaker 2: 10:23

Okay, yes, I would say yes. This is because for you to be able to solve something as just you, just as you stated, you should have been able to experience it where you are in that context, right, so it helps you tailor solutions to that experience. So I would say it's totally out of it's bringing in the Western let's say, people from the Western world, but then it's better and much more relatable. For instance, I would use my example. I encountered like a young girl about three years ago. So it's felt like I saw my eight year old self in her and that was like an entry point for me, because she was facing exactly what I had faced and I was able to relate with it in that community because I had faced this and I could easily tailor solutions towards her and also speak to people around me who had seen that this was a challenge and they would now be able to see how we can work together as a team to solve it. I would also say that, for instance, I traveled for the Mandela Washington Fellowship last year to the US.

Speaker 2: 11:45

I was one of the Nigerians selected for it and most of my experience and some of the things I learned with catering for persons with disabilities in as much as I learned them over there when I came here. I couldn't immediately implement them because the context here is different. So all I did was I learned, brought them back home and tried to see how to tailor some of the solutions and what was already existing there over here. So it's much more easier for people to solve people in that local environment to solve their local challenges by themselves. But it doesn't stop you from learning and also trying to bring in what you've learned over here. And right, of course, you could bring in some form of professional persons at one point and all of that, but then it's really best for you to be able to handle that.

Speaker 3: 12:36

I agree and I think, as you said, you doing a fellowship in the United States, you were able to learn what was being said and say all right now, how I would apply that back in my home country is like this, and I think that's something that's really critical, because I remember being I went years ago and I spoke in Kenya and the people were telling me things that I had never experienced in the United States. Just personally, I had never experienced these issues that they were talking about, and I'll give you an example of it, but in other countries I had been, in a lot of countries, and so I just think it's important to continue to remember that the way that we really truly be included is when we do things like you're doing Praise. Where was the Praise adult when you were eight years old and needed support? Thank goodness you could be there for this lovely soul that's eight years old, because what can that child accomplish just by this early intervention?

Speaker 3: 13:39

So I just think it's really worth repeating that over and over, and I'll give you an example when I did go and speak in Kenya, they were telling me stories about what was happening with witch doctors, what was happening with you know people assuming if you have epilepsy, you have demons in you, and there were just a lot of experiences that I personally had not walked.

Speaker 3: 14:06

I had walked other experiences as a person with a disability, myself being told Neil, I got some papers that I had saved since I was in high school many years ago and I was looking at some of the papers and, wow, the teacher said really bad things about me, like I was disruptive, I talked too much, I didn't wait my turn. I know they were so unfair. Sorry, praise, but it's just funny because our life experiences certainly prepare us, but there's something to be said about really walking these paths and understanding how things work in our own countries if we really want to have true impact, which is why we really appreciate your praise. So I don't want to hog the microphone. So, antonio, I don't know if you wanted to come in here.

Speaker 4: 15:03

Yes, and just following a similar topic. So my question to you, Fred how do you think that the local communities can co-create to find solutions for themselves that have been used in other regions, in other countries, but somehow adjusting that to their needs and use their knowledge, considering also the resources that are available locally, in order to make sure that things can actually work for the communities?

Speaker 2: 15:45

Okay, all right, thank you. So I would begin from the foundation, because before the communities can actually think of co-creating, we ourselves I wouldn't say they themselves we ourselves need to understand the need, like the problem. So the reason I'm using this word is, before we began talking about disability inclusion, trying to see how the communities can involve themselves into what we are doing, it was initially a challenge because they already saw persons with disabilities, the general social stigma, but then you could hear them use certain words like just like what Deborah said epilepsy, imbeciles and all of that. So it really made persons with disabilities not confident with themselves. Parents who had children with disabilities always preferred to keep their children indoors and so, of course, this hampered their confidence and their ability to be able to step out or come out of their houses. So before I just move to talking about how they can co-create, I would say that within our local communities, we have to continue to spread awareness of disability and how people should see them for their abilities and not the disability. So see them first, before the disability.

Speaker 2: 17:23

For instance, there was a day I was working and somebody was trying to refer to a child who had, I think yes, that child had, she was visually impaired, and the person said can you call that blind girl? So I had to speak to the person much later. So at that point the person is first of all considering the disability before the girl. So I was like it would really be best for you to look at this person before that disability so you could even probably say words like that girl who is visually impaired, or well, you could still say who is blind. So these are like certain strategies that the local community can ensure that the awareness continues.

Speaker 2: 18:20

Of course awareness is something that must continue Then before we can now begin to think about how solutions can be co-created. So, looking at that aspect now, I would say that resources can actually be scarce. For instance, I work with persons in rural communities, underrepresented societies or marginalized places, represented societies or marginalized places. So you it's really clear that the resources are really not there probably to cooperate solutions. But I can say that we can begin from where we are first, because before you get support, people need to see what you have done. People need to see that probably this community sorry, an Antonio, I don't know if you're saying something- no, no, no, I'm just following up on what you're saying.

Speaker 2: 19:12

Okay. So people need to understand that they should begin from where they are, and for us, we had to begin with what we had. So self-funding support from family, friends, support from people who began to see our work online, and that began to gradually create visibility and bring in support. But if we never started, nothing like that would have ever begun would have ever begun. So we now began to see and get in people who were already um professionals at handling persons with disabilities.

Speaker 2: 19:55

I, of course, I wasn't a professional. I was still learning why, still working. So people feel like you have to really be an expert before you get into whatever you want to do. But I just tell myself that, okay, get the knowledge, collaborate with people, and then you would get more people into your space, because nothing ever works without a worker. So if we don't get it started, we will never get it working. Yes, so I would say that begin, look out for collaborations and then, with that, you can get some people into your team who can support and maybe co-create solutions from what they've learned from wherever they are, or the work or the experience they've had over time, and the work becomes better.

Speaker 1: 20:42

Thank you antonio, were you following up? Thank you.

Speaker 4: 20:52

Antonio, were you following up? I could just a quick follow up on it. We know that today social networks and the web is all over. Everyone has some form of access. Do you see that the fact that social networks can have a positive impact on awareness on disability within Nigeria, or because that relates, might relate with other countries? People don't relate. How do you see the impact of that?

Speaker 2: 21:23

Okay, so can you clarify the social network aspect?

Speaker 4: 21:27

So when people use there's many people who create awareness on disability on TikTok, on Twitter, on Facebook, people from other countries. When people in Nigeria access that content, do you see that content can have a positive impact or is too distant from them?

Speaker 2: 21:53

Okay, so I would say both a yes and a no. Okay, so a yes, of course it can have a positive impact on them, because for me, too, it has had a positive impact on me. There were certain contents I read online. I never thought that, oh, this was actually possible. So I I have also seen some content online that we were able to tailor into the work we do at Yield Up Development Initiative and also at Dogalove. So let me make I'll make reference to Dogalove more with those contents. So, for instance, we had I think I'm open to calling his name, nathan Nathan spoke at the conference last year and Nathan is someone who has lived with disability, but then he was really able to share his story at the conference and how the service animal has supported him so far.

Speaker 2: 23:02

Just by sharing that, I could remember that one of the persons who attended the conference was so wild and said, asking us questions so how does this work? Now, this was because somebody came out to share something vital that he or she never thought was in existence, right, so that's a form of social network, because we utilized the zoom platform and it was shared on our youtube channel and that was really able to support that person. The person um asked that how can I get a service animal, what does it involve, and all of that. So we continued with the conversation and where it is and how it has, as we can speak now, it has actually helped the person. So I would now speak from the other context.

Speaker 2: 23:51

So I would say no, because some of the content are tailored to their experiences where they are. The reason I say their experiences where they are, or let's say, the support system that you've gotten so far, where they are. In fact, just in Nigeria, I may share a content and it may not be directly applicable to that person or this particular disability, because it's it varies and support for each disability it's not a one-size-fits-all approach. So the support varies and even for each individual you're interacting with, it still varies. So I would say that generally, the social network is a good space for awareness creation and all of that. I would still say that when we consume those contents, we can tailor it to if we are working in that space, we can tailor it to that particular solution and see if that works. But then, if that doesn't work, you will find other ways or probably other measures to see how you can still achieve what you want to achieve. Yeah, so that would be it.

Speaker 3: 25:06

Praise. I know that we're almost out of time and that we have to thank our sponsors, but I also wanted to bring up I think you bring up such a good point about people with disabilities trying to learn in Nigeria to be proud of themselves, when society has constantly told them you're a problem, you're broken, hide your children away, just. We have cultural issues with disabilities all over the world, you know, but there are in some countries. It is so intense, it's just so much harder for everybody. So but I also think when you I like the word, I was writing notes about what you were saying when you were using the words co-create, because I think there is really power to bringing in people that have a lot of experience, successful experience in other countries, working locally with the people that understand what is really happening in the country and all the nuances of being living in particular. You know any country, but just say Nigeria, since we're talking about your country.

Speaker 3: 26:11

But I I also see sometimes local people really understanding their own walks and what they've had to do and how hard it is and all the the obstacles that are in the way. And then you have, you know, experts coming in from other countries saying, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, but just do it this way and you know that won't work, and so it's such. It's such a balance, trying to get it right, especially when the people themselves don't always agree that they should be included, or the families we've seen. We've seen people hide their children in Panama because they thought, when the census workers were coming through, that their children were going to get with disabilities, were going to be taken away from them because maybe they weren't caring for them, correct? So I was just wondering if, in the work that you're doing, are y'all seeing some of the complications like that being carried out, or is it getting a little bit more clear about what needs to be done to truly have impact for these people's lives?

Speaker 2: 27:22

Okay, so I think my network went off a bit. The last part of what you said, when you're trying to ask the question, I didn't get you clearly.

Speaker 3: 27:32

Yeah, and I'm just wondering if you're finding that it is getting easier to work with other experts locally. Are you finding that it's getting easier now that you're starting to get your hands around what the needs are getting easier now that you're starting to get your hands around what the needs are, or is this still something you're still really in the grassroots efforts, trying to figure out? How do we move this forward? And I mean there's nothing wrong with that. I think you can say that of any of our countries.

Speaker 2: 27:59

Okay, all right, so I would say that it's getting easier. Um, I would speak from my experiences. Um, then now narrow it to other person's experience, because I've had one or two conversations with other persons. So for me, the reason why it's getting easier is because I have begun to get exposure outside my local environment. So whenever I have the opportunity to co-create solutions with experts over there, I am able to understand them. For who? They are still able to present our needs whatsoever. It is that we want to actually bring a solution together and we can find a balance and know how to bring that solution into what we are doing. I can say that it becomes easier when both parties understand each other.

Speaker 2: 29:03

From the conversations I've had with some persons, I've seen some persons who have not really gotten it so easy because they felt that, okay, the other persons have not understood what the need is if we are able to present that problem well in very simple terms or simple languages that they can understand with visuals, not just by speaking. So there are quite a number of ways that we can explain whatsoever the problem is. So I think utilizing various means of explaining the problem can help our experts or web ITs that will be coming into the picture to understand what the challenge is. Another thing is before you mentioned something around the cultural biases and all of that. So I also noticed that where we are and where our initiative began, there's quite a lot around that.

Speaker 2: 30:10

So we try, if we try to really ensure that we are bringing in any professional experts, we should have prompts, like we should have really spoken to them over time with the local persons, go there, mix it before trying to explain to them, because immediately they get to see a professional or an expert coming, there's quite this sort of shift from them, a bit of fear, and they also begin to think like, okay, this person just came to check what the challenge is, then to just get funding and leave, right, right. But then we try to ensure that they understand what we are coming for and with that they are quite comfortable to a point and we are now able to to get that because we involve the community. So I'm not challenging these people don't involve the community. So from the onset the community leaders should be involved. We should have gotten their buy-in. Everything necessary that should be done should have been done. So it becomes easy that way.

Speaker 3: 31:17

So it's hopeful we're going to end in a hopeful note. We're starting to make progress. But you must include the community. So back over to you, Neil. But thank you, Praise.

Speaker 1: 31:27

Thank you. Thank you very you, praise. Thank you, thank you very much, praise. Yes, we are pretty much at the end of our time, which is a real shame because I think we could talk on for quite a bit more. So it remains for me to thank our friends and sponsors, mycleartext and Amazon, for keeping us on air and captioned, and we really look forward to continuing this conversation on social media. So thank you very much, grace.

Speaker 2: 31:51

All right, thank you so much.