A NEW CLASS BEGINS

Waves of blue, khaki and green can often be seen flying across the beautiful hills of Marbial, a hilly rural section of Jacmel in the Southeastern part of Haiti. The multicolored waves are a meld of myriad brightly colored uniforms of local school children on their way to and from class. In these parts, it is the pride of every parent to have a child don a school uniform; though it is a huge struggle for most. And in Marbial fewer and fewer families are able to afford the meager $150.00 USD a year for average school tuition that would enable their child to wear a school uniform.

So once the school bells ring, “you often see many children hanging around the market place with no place to go and nothing else to do aside from helping their parents in the fields during the planting season.”, explains Father Bertrand Dieuveille who heads the St. Therese School in Marbial.

Many of these children are either orphans living with relatives or are from families who struggle to meet even basic needs. “So not only do these children face extraordinary challenges at home, but they also have the added burden of feeling left out as they watch other school children each day on their way to school in this small and tight knit community. “

Having witnessed the increasing number of these children every day, Father Bertrand took it upon himself this school year to start a series of new classes in two of the empty rooms of the St. Therese school. The classes are informal and completely free of charge. Fr. Bertrand hopes that with support, the classes can evolve and eventually offer a full curriculum and educational advancement to the children.

For the time being the children are taught basic reading, writing and math. Fr. Bertrand, who struggles to pay teachers for even the regular school because so many parents cannot keep up with payments, now struggles to pay two teachers and provide books and supplies for the two classes. However, he forges on and holds classes regularly for an increasing number of students.
The Marbial class is a response to a nation-wide need to provide educational opportunity to all children in Haiti. With over 80 percent of the schools being private and fee for service, this will surely be a daunting task. Yet, if Fr. Bertrand’s experiment is a success, it can be a model for many poor communities.

The classes still need a lot of support including: supplies and materials, curriculum development, activities development, and more. Beyond Travel is recruiting volunteers with backgrounds and/or interest in education, work with disadvantaged children to assist and support the development of the classes into a worthwhile program.