Local activist and Blossom Inc.’s founder, Ayodele Dalgety-Dean, is a ‘Special Person’

Feb 07, 2021 News, Special Person

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Filling a critical gap in the childcare protection and family development sphere…

 

 

 

By Rehanna Ramsay

Kaieteur News – It was six years ago, that local child protection advocate, Ayodele Dalgety-Dean, embarked on a project that changed the trajectory of how survivors of rape, sexual assault and other types of trauma receive support to recover and lead somewhat normal lives.
Since then, the Blossom Incorporated founder has been leading her team of very committed counsellors and support officers to conduct successful interviews, therapy sessions and outreaches aimed at helping children and families overcome the deep psychological trauma, they sustained through some of life’s horrific experiences.
Dalgety-Dean told Kaieteur News this week, that her advocacy work was spawned out of her passion for addressing the full spectrum of child protection issues.
That passion has thrust her into the spotlight of child protection efforts in Guyana. Her move to create and sustain Child Advocacy Centres (CAC) across the country has been lauded by those in her field.
This week’s ‘Special Person,’ is not just a social entrepreneur but a loving mother of her three children –Thandi, Mya and Zion, and dedicated wife to Gregory Dean – Chief Executive Officer of telecoms giant, Digicel (Guyana).
Despite her steadfast commitment to family, Dalgety-Dean has sacrificed time away from the comfort of her home in Georgetown to travel to several remote locations in the hinterland and even rural Guyana to host interviews, therapy sessions and training to support survivors of trauma.
Her work with childcare services started long before Blossom Inc. was even thought. She said that the idea was actually birthed many moons ago, while she was in the United Kingdom—a place that she once called home.
Dalgety-Dean started off her career in the UK after she completed her studies at a number of prestigious Universities in London, but she is not yet finished with her acquisition of knowledge to sharpen her activism. The family therapist is currently a PhD candidate researching suicide in Guyana.
This week’s ‘Special Person’ is a holder of a degree in political studies from the London Guildhall University, certified in financial management and holds a Post Graduate Diploma in Systemic Therapy with Families and Couples from University of London, Birkbeck College.
The latter is where she said she found her life’s calling.

 

FIRM VALUES
Dalgety-Dean told Kaieteur News that she grew up in a secure home circle of strong values, which served as a compass for finding her life’s work.

She told this newspaper that her father, Tom Dalgety, a chemical industrialist and businessman and her mother, Ernestine Dalgety, a former social services officer, instilled in her and her four siblings, the firm principles they needed to lead meaningful lives.
Mr. Dalgety, a proud Pan-Africanist (a person who believes that people from Africa and their descendants should be united), who is credited for introducing African films to Guyana through his self-titled cinematic venture “Dalgety’s Africa,” was the driving force behind ensuring that his children understood their African heritage and were proud of their roots.
“For instance, my father always found ways to incorporate our African heritage into our lives. We all have afro-inspired names. My name Ayodele is from Nigeria, the Yoruba-tribe and it means “joy comes home,” asserted Dalgety-Dean.
Added to this, she said, “My father would always say that we should strive to be our own boss because as Africans, we are born leaders. You must be employers not employees!”
“He said that we are not to work with others but rather we should be the ones providing them with employment,” Dalgety-Dean said, adding that on the other hand, her mother, though she held some ideals, was not so stern on what they choose to do for a living.

“She had worked in the civil service for many years, so she would advocate for us to get a good civil service job and settle down,” the family and childcare advocate added with a smile.
Dalgety-Dean recalled, however, that her parents gave her and her siblings the scope they needed to develop their individuality.
“My father in particular made no distinction between us because of our genders, he made sure we had the same opportunities,” she said.
Given the family’s solid values, the Dalgety clan took their education seriously. The young Ayodele secured her education via the St. Margaret’s Primary School. She started her ‘O’ and ‘A’ levels at Queen’s College and completed them in London.
“I remember that I did not know what I wanted to do after I graduated, so I called my father and said I am finished with school what should I do now? And his response was girl that is not my decision you have to decide what you want. So I decided that in my opinion I was good at managing people so I decided to study politics because it’s the management of people,” she said of her decision to attend the London-based University.
However, by the time she was finished with her politics studies, Dalgety-Dean’s interest had shifted and she applied to be a part of a graduate management programme at Marks and Spencer’s firm in London.

She later secured employment as a financial analyst in another firm in London but said that she soon found that a job in financing was not quite what she wanted to do for the remainder of her life.
“I did not quite like the idea of having to do accounting and finance in the long run, so I left my job in finance and began to look for what I really wanted,” Dalgety-Dean said. She noted that at the time she had a background in childcare.
The family therapist said that she was always working part-time with playgroups during her school years in London.
She noted, “I thoroughly enjoyed it, so I started to look for something that had to do with children.” As a consequence, Dalgety-Dean applied to several social work agencies.
She noted that there was this one agency in particular (Family Welfare Association in London), that was doing a project called ‘Building Bridges,’ which she was interested in and eventually got the job.
The Blossom Inc. Founder shared with Kaieteur News that she was not really intended to be interviewed for the position but was chosen as a wild card interviewee.
“I wasn’t in their list but they liked my answer and guess what? That was the perfect job for me it paved the way for all that I do with Blossom today,” she said. Dalgety-Dean described the years of her early career “as having a grand time.”
As an employee of the agency, Dalgety-Dean found her passion for childcare and family issues but she was also challenged to grow in the field.
“I loved what I did but I was also intimidated because I was managing people who were specialist in their fields. It challenged me to specialize in what I did too,” she added.

As a result, the young manager read for her postgraduate diploma at University of London, Birkbeck College.
She later got married and started planning on having children with her husband when he secured a job with Digicel. They had decided to return home to Guyana.
“After we returned, I had this plan to home school my children and volunteer for social work. I was not thinking of anything fulltime, but I was on visiting committee for the local children’s home and I saw all the need and I guess always wanted to do more but I was not certain where I would fit best,” she added.
That opportunity to have a more permanent role in the childcare development sphere came after she unintentionally met the then Minister of Human Services at a hair salon.
Dalgety-Dean noted that while some may think of this as a mere coincidence, for her it was fate.
“I was there just talking, and I didn’t even know that she [the minister] was at the salon as well.
Minister heard me and offered me the opportunity to sit on the Visiting Committee for Children’s Homes, which I then Chaired. From this I then sat on the Adoption Board,” she recalled of meeting the Minister.
From then, Dalgety- Dean began to build a relationship with the Childcare and Protection Agency.
By 2012, she was exposed to the need for support in the area of child and family trauma therapy and longed to help fill the gap.
“I saw the need for support systems but there weren’t resources for them…I think it was around 2013 while I was on holiday in London, when I learned of the concept of Child Advocacy Centres [CAC] and I thought to myself that it could work in Guyana,” she recalled of the idea to start the NGO.

 

BLOSSOM INC.
The social entrepreneurship venture took about a year to develop, before the doors of Blossom Inc. were opened in late October 2014.
Dalgety-Dean explained that at the time of starting the not-for-profit organization, the child protection system needed tremendous support and my background is child sexual abuse and families affected by severe trauma.
“I responded to a call for collaboration by the Child Protection Agency which falls under the purview of the Ministry of Social Protection for what was then referred to as a ‘One Stop Shop’ to deal with child sexual abuse and that is how Blossom Inc.’s Child Advocacy Centre was born.”
The founder noted that her family played an integral role in helping to set up the centre.
“Even the name Blossom which was given to the NGO came out of a discussion I had with my daughters. I was telling them that I wanted to start an NGO because bad things happened to children sometimes and I was giving them an example of how a flower would wither if it is not given the correct treatment, but with the right care it blooms and blossoms to become what it was intended to be and my daughter said why don’t you name it Blossom. So that’s how the name came about,” she explained. Last October, she revealed, Blossom Inc. marked six years of offering support to trauma stricken families and children.
The organization works with children and families affected by severe trauma: child sexual abuse, children who have suffered and witness extreme violence, children who have witnessed a parent’s death, migrant children and families.
The services includes forensic interviews; trauma focused therapy court support victim advocacy /support psychosocial support; education and outreach services; migrant and host community service; coordination of the Multi Disciplinary Team (MDT) to support victims of child sexual abuse.
During the interview, Dalgety-Dean noted that some of the main challenges their clients have faced includes, anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, behavioural issues, relational issues with friends and family, withdrawal symptoms, substance abuse, grades dropping, low self esteem.
She noted that “certainly those within the social services and civil society fields of work play an important role in helping survivors to heal through various support mechanisms.”
The founder stressed however, that “lots of education needs to be done in our society to educate people of the effects of trauma and how it manifests so that society at large, including family and friends, resists the victim blaming that is so prevalent, even when dealing with children.”
As such, Blossom Inc. has established and operates CACs to support the child protection system throughout Guyana in locations: Region One – Mabaruma; Region Two – Essequibo Coast (Land of Plenty); Region Four – East Bank Demerara; Region Seven – Bartica; Region 10 – Linden; Region 10 – Kwakwani.
The NGO currently has 26 staffers who have served in excess of 6,000 users to date.
Even throughout the COVID- 19 pandemic in 2020, “the workers at the NGO conducted over 395 Forensic Interviews and 246 clients have been referred,” Dalgety-Dean said.
She also spoke of Blossom’s collaboration with UNICEF to provide psychosocial support to over 2,000 migrant children and families and revealed that the organization received support from the International Office for Migration to provide emergency shelter for some 246 migrant children and families.
The main funders of the initiatives are the Government of Guyana, UNICEF, Emerge BPO and a list of other ad hoc private sector companies.
Dalgety-Dean stressed, nonetheless, that the greatest rewards of Blossom’s work has been in the increase of successful prosecutions in sexual offence cases.
“The healing that this encourages for our clients, seeing the positive results through enhanced coping skills of clients who embraced the trauma focused therapy, advocating for and seeing the opening of the sexual offences courts and being able to offer a ‘one stop’ safe place for victims to tell their story of trauma only once and to the same professional, has been the ultimate blessing,” she said.
For her dedication to her activism, we at Kaieteur News today bestow our title of ‘Special Person’ to Dalgety-Dean

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