In the middle of the deadly political unrest that has rocked Haiti for more than two months, another crisis is unfolding — most schools are closed, leaving Haitian children with nothing to do and their parents flailing to cope.
In some homes, parents are trying to teach their own kids, while simultaneously working to assuage their mounting anxiety about the violence they see every day in the streets. “I’m muddling through. I don’t really know how to do all this,” confesses Edine Celestin, who is holding a reading workbook in her lap.
“One might think it’s easy to teach your kids, but you only realise afterwards that the child did not understand what you said, and you have to teach the same lesson three or four times.”
Since September, Celestin has tried to make sure her five-year-old daughter gets some kind of schooling each day. Their living room has become a classroom. But somewhere between her bedroom and the makeshift schoolhouse, little Lyne-Renee is prone to boredom — she hardly ever even leaves the house anymore, due to the risk of violence erupting outside.
“She has to know how to read and write, at least a little bit, in order to be admitted to a primary school next year,” Celestin says.
“Registration will take place in January and February. We have a lot of work to do,” adds the worried mother, who knows that the spots in the best schools are highly coveted.
Haiti’s public schools already suffer from a severe lack of funding and teachers. They can only accommodate a third of the pupils.
The impoverished Caribbean nation’s crisis began in late August, prompted by a national fuel shortage. Since then, protests against unpopular President Jovenel Moise have raged.
Barricades block the streets, and armed gangs roam freely. Nearly 70 per cent of the schools have remained closed, according to the UN Children’s Fund (Unicef) and its cultural agency Unesco.
“The school principal told us several times, ‘Come on Monday to do a bit of work.’ When we arrive, the teachers are not there, and the principal is alone with five or six students,” explains
Reevens Bosquet, who is 20 but still hopes to complete his high school education.
Bosquet is not alone — many children in Haiti get a late start on going to school and suffer through frequent interruptions in their attendance along the way when their parents cannot afford to send them. As a result, many students fall behind.
Bosquet and his two brothers, who live with a cousin because their neighbourhood is riddled with crime, are worried that the last two months will set them back even farther. — AFP
Amelie BARON
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