Gituro preschool, Nyagatare
On the right track
-Are we really going this way?
-This is a cow path, right?
Dance for joy
When we visited them, the children put on a traditional dance show that they had prepared earlier for the contest between them and the Rwimiyaga preschool last term. Sitting down together with the school administrator, Captain Grace and the teachers faces glowing when talking about the dance team that they want to develop, with real traditional clothing and all. ”They learn to cooperate and they make people happy with their dance”, Mrs Ruth says.
Preschool in the Hall
The preschool meet in the Salvation Army Hall that was built when the village was built. It was then the Community Center and still works like that when needed.
There is no room for the preschool, so we take out the black board, the chairs and tables when school is in and take it out at holidays and weekends. 100 children attend Gituro preschool and every day the children get porridge for nourishment.
Going to school?
To attend preschool is a new thing here. The government want every child to go, but cannot afford to give it to them. Rwanda is still trying to reach the goal to get 100% of the children to attend primary school from age 7 (7-13) which is free of charge. About 95% of the children start Primary but less than 75% finishes. And if you want to go to Secondary school (lower 13-16, upper 16-19) you and your family will have to pay all fees, school uniform, materials, transport, everything, so very few families can afford that.
Can´t I stay?!
Captain Grace: ”Our biggest dream right now is to be able to build and run a primary school, because the children here don´t want to leave our preschool at age 7. The families think it is too far to walk the two hours all the way to town and to the primary school there. So we have the older children here still and are trying to teach some primary for them. We believe that we can do as good a job for a Primary school as we do for Preschool"
The Salvation Army Sponsorship supports this preschool. Our donors and sponsors supply with nourishment, education and Early Childhood Development for all these children. We are very happy to have all of you to help fight poverty and empower these families with all this.
We are also happy for our teachers. They are GOLD! I don´t know how we would manage without them...
In Gituro, Mrs Ruth is the teacher/boss :) ...So now we want to say
Thank you for sharing our childrens life!
Photos: Carolina Tuftstrom
Photo shop: Anna-Maria
All photos can be used by permission for The Salvation Army work. Others just send an e-mail and we´ll work it out :)
