the world health organization says three million girls a year are cut in this way, but molly melching and other aid workers have discovered how to persuade whole communities to give up their ancient practice. >> in recent years, thousands of rural communities in senegal have come to extraordinary public rallies. they call them declaratio. they're e d claired an end to a deeply rooted practice rarely discussed in public and commonly called female circumcision. >> never in my wildest dreams could i have imagined that i would be sitting here years later, 13 years later, saying that 4,792 communities in senegal had abandoned. in the beginning it was just unthought of, unbelievable, because it was so taboo. >> molly melching found a group called tostan, which means "breakthrough" in the local wolof language, in the early '90s. she had modest goals: to educate people about health and human rights, especially in rural areas and in local languages. tostan's work often begins with an ice-breaker, like an old movie. many in the audience have never watched a film. to overcome the language barrie