Education
We build and support schools for children in rural areas and fund programs for older students to continue their education.
About Us
Le Korsa is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, founded in 2005, devoted to improving human lives in Senegal. In Pulaar, a predominant language in the Tambacounda region where we mostly work, “korsa” means “love from respect.”
We have an affiliate organization in France that accepts tax-deductible donations, and we are accredited in the United Kingdom and Ireland. We are an officially registered NGO in Senegal and work closely with doctors, teachers, students and community leaders in their villages and cities.
How We Work
We believe in longevity and long-term partnerships. We have known some of our doctor partners since they were in medical school; now they are running their own clinics. Students that we met through our scholarship program are now professionals working as accountants, agroforestry technicians, nurses, teachers, and more.
Our Work
Health
We subsidize medical care for patients who cannot afford it and bring medical supplies to hospitals and rural health centers.
Arts and Culture
We unite artists from Senegal and around the world to exchange ideas, learn from one another, and spread the power of creativity.
Agriculture and Environment
We empower rural communities to become better farmers, so they can earn income and improve their diets.
Le Korsa and the Albers Foundation
Anni and Josef Albers believed that the pleasures of seeing are universal and timeless. The many voices of color, the palpable thrill of geometric form, have helped offset the difficulties of earthly existence for all people in all time periods.
The enhancement of life, for everyone, mattered more to Anni and Josef than did their own individual pasts, issues of nationalism or race, or artistic doctrine. When the Albers Foundation created Le Korsa, it was because we knew that the real legacy of Anni and Josef was their wish for people everywhere to savor existence. The Alberses felt themselves to be the spiritual heirs of all people with the capacity to know the miracle of life, whether the women with back strap looms weaving vibrant textiles in ninth century Peru, or the men who piled stones and constructed the soaring vaults of Gothic cathedrals. By working directly with doctors and teachers and our other partners in some of the most isolated villages of rural Senegal as well as some of the poorest communities in Dakar, we are doing our best to fulfill the Alberses’ dream of opening eyes.
History
2005
Le Korsa is initially founded as American Friends of Le Kinkeliba to fund the French NGO, Le Kinkeliba.
2007
Le Korsa becomes its own 501(c)(3) nonprofit.
2010
Le Korsa's first school construction project, the Sinthian Kindergarten, is built.
2015
Thread, the artists' residency and cultural center, opens in Sinthian. Le Korsa begins an agricultural program.
2016
Le Korsa takes over operations and financing of Les Foyers des Tambacounda.
The Sinthian Women's Farming Collective outgrows its space at Thread and begins farming a full hectare of land.
Keur Djiguene Yi, Women's Center of Dakar, opens.
2017
Construction on the Fass School begins.
Le Korsa helps form the Fass Women's Community Farm.
2018
Radio Tabadian, the community radio station, opens in Gouloumbou.
2019
The Fass School welcomes its first students. Construction on the redesign of Tambacounda's Maternity and Pediatric Units begins. The Foyer in Dakar begins hosting Foyer graduates now attending university in Dakar.
2021
Construction is completed on Tambacounda Hospital's Maternity and Pediatric Units.
2022
The Women's Community Farms, which now encompass Sinthian, Fass, Dialico and Gadapara, set a record for onion harvests.
2023
Le Korsa is granted NGO status in Senegal.