Happy Friday, Everyone!
This update will discuss our summer programs and some new kids we have accepted into the Foundation.
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We are proud to announce that this year, our third year in Jacmel, all but five of our students passed in their schooling and are competing with the other children in their classes. Since arriving here, our students have struggled and put in a ton of effort to learn French. We’ve spent time and resources on making sure all of our students have special after school help, both in and outside of the Foundation. Not only did the vast majority pass, but many students are excelling and competing with their peers. The school does a ranking at the end of each period, and five students placed either 1st or 2nd in their classes.
We started off the summer with a bang by throwing a party to celebrate the children’s success. Since then, we’ve begun our summer program, which takes a break from academics. This year our summer program was inspired by another school in Haiti called L’ecole du Village. They are located down the southwest coast near Les Cayes, and we’ve been fortunate enough to connect with them on several occasions. They use a curriculum based on the methodology proposed by Rudolph Steiner- a methodology that emphasizes helping children discover the capacities within themselves in order to connect to their full potential. The curriculum includes art, movement, and story telling which allows children to have a more complete understanding of the material they are learning. Inspired by this approach, we spent our first week of the summer doing theater. It was brand new, something we’ve never tried before, and it was a complete success. The children were divided into age groups, and they were involved in creating the characters, rehearsing roles, and making the set. After five days of preparation, each class presented their play for the others. We are very proud of their willingness to try something new and even uncomfortable for some. There are more than a few students who are shy or insecure and would normally not volunteer to partake in activities like this.
Left, Assistant Director, Ruth, stands with the group that she assisted in a theater project.
Garry, a dragon in his theater group, sits with his new costume.
We are also spending some time this summer in drawing, painting, and crafts, and are splitting up these activities with days of free for all sports. There is a nearby stadium that has a beautiful soccer field, as well as a tennis court and basketball court. We recently learned that they have no problem opening it up to us upon request for a very small fee.
We have accepted 13 new, local kids this month and will be accepting another 8 before the summer is over. Parents from the area have been coming to see us for over a year to ask for help. We had slowly started accepting kids from the area before now, but this year we finally began an organized process to open up to more families. We choose children based on “first come, first serve” and there also has to be open space for the child’s age group. Everyone who has been waiting since last year was able to find a spot this year, which resulted in some very grateful parents. Once the word was out that new kids were showing up, we received an influx of mothers also wanting to “register” their kids, but we had to sadly tell them that they’d have to wait for next year. The new students have been great- eager, participatory, and appreciative, and we are extremely proud to be expanding our services to the greater area.
Welcome new students! These thirteen children became part of our group earlier this month.
As always thank you all for your support, none of this would be possible without the generosity of our donors. Together we are making a real difference in our people’s lives.
Warm wishes,
Catherine, David, and all of us at the JRF
