OASIS advances education and choice for women and girls in the Sahel — so they can stay in school, decide if and when to marry, and make informed choices about their own bodies and futures.
A Healthier, More Resilient Sahel Starts With Her Choice.
The Highest Rates of Child Marriage & Maternal Deaths. The Fewest Resources.
OASIS works across the francophone and Hausa-speaking Sahel and northern Nigeria — a region of profound need and huge untapped female potential, yet among the least donor attention of anywhere on earth.
Climate Change Is a Crisis for Girls’ Health.
Rising temperatures, shrinking farmland, and rapid population growth are colliding in the Sahel. OASIS works at the intersection of climate, education, and reproductive health — because none of these problems can be solved in isolation.
Our Shared Impact
400,000 girls reached through Safe Spaces, with a 20-fold increase in secondary school completion
2.5 years — average delay in age of marriage among program participants
Integrated the essential medicine, misoprostol, into 23 countries’ policies, impacting access for 385 million women
Over 18,800 health workers trained to deliver life-saving reproductive health medicines
Over $7.4 Million mobilized for Sahel-based organization
Trained and supported over 650 emerging leaders from 8 West African Countries
Our Approach
OASIS focuses its work in the Sahel where the need is most acute and least resourced. Together with our coalition of African partners, we work on issues central to the well-being of women and girls across their lives, in three program areas:
Mentored Safe Spaces where girls build life skills, delay marriage, and stay in school — in communities where the alternative is often marriage well before the age of 18.
Getting essential reproductive health medicines, like misoprostol, into the hands of front-line health workers and women, to prevent the leading causes of maternal death and disability.
Training and connecting women-led and grassroots Sahelian organizations and leaders so evidence turns into policy and funding at scale.
How we work
Led from the Sahel. Backed from UC Berkeley. OASIS maintains a small US-based footprint, serving as a:
Technical partner & co-implementer— We provide monitoring & evaluation, research, and advocacy capacity that most local partners don't yet have in-house — so their models can prove themselves and scale.
Funding bridge — We move flexible, multi-year funding to vetted, women-led partners who often can't yet absorb international grants directly.
Convener & amplifier — We connect isolated women leaders across a vast, hard-to-reach region, and carry their evidence and voices to regional and global decision-makers.
Program Spotlight: Girls Education
“In my family, it only took one generation and an educated mother with vision… My father who never went to school, now has a daughter who is working as a scientist at NASA on climate change.
Educating a girl means educating a nation. We are enabling a future generation who will and must be at the forefront of science and technology and creating meaningful change.”
- Fadji Zaouna Maina, PhD (Niger)
Associate Research Scientist, NASA and OASIS Board Member
Consider a tax-free donation in support of women and girls in the Sahel. Your gift can make a world of difference:
Protects 100 women in childbirth
$100
Educates a girl for two years in Safe Spaces
$300
Supports an emerging female leader to advocate regionally
$1,000
Sponsors one safe space club for 18 girls for two full years
$5,000
Partner With Us
We would love to hear from you!
Email
info@oasissahel.org
Address
PO Box 10144
Berkeley, CA 94709
Phone
+1.415.935.4812