Differing Environments

Being the social scientist that I am, I am fascinated and always amazed at the environments the kids in my student learn in. Like most developing countries – there are the standard crowding, lighting and circulation issues, but each school has these issues in so many different ways. To illustrate, I’ll compare our two mamba schools; Henri Christophe (HC) and Oasis.

First, what these schools have in common. Every student in every school wears a uniform. Each school in Cap-Haitien has a different one in order to tell which kid goes where. The uniforms for HC are blue checked shirts with blue pants. Oasis has orange pants and beige shirts. The school day starts at 8 am and goes until 12 pm. There is one recess. Subjects taught include geography, science, math, French, Creole and history. Three times a year students take week long tests. The grades they receive on these tests dictate whether or not they pass and move onto the next grade. This is for all schools. Now onto the differences.

Oasis is one of our largest schools in terms of enrollment. There are roughly 600 students in the school with just over 300 participating in the study. Each grade has two classes and there are also the preschool and kindergarten versions. Every class has between one and two teachers, plus there is two administrators and two groundskeepers.

The school is private, part of Baptist church in the area. This means that families pay a larger tuition for kids to attend. While almost all schools will have a tuition, private schools are more expensive but often offer better teachers or other perks like sports, school lunch, English classes, etc.

The school is located just on the outskirts of downtown Cap-Haitien. It’s on a busy road that leads to the market so there is always traffic. Just outside of the school are vendors selling snacks, food and other household items. There are three buildings which make up the school. Two are within the school’s gates and one is on the other side of the road. There is electricity, a water pump, and three flush latrines for the students to use. The classrooms are decorated with paintings and posters.

HC on the other hand is a public school located in Petit-Anse, a low-income neighborhood on the outside of town. There is no tuition for students at this school because it qualifies for a new government program in an effort to start free education nationwide. There are just 140 kids in the school – 110 are in the study. There are five teachers and one administrators for six grades. There is also a groundskeeper who will help out with repairs around the school.

Here’s the kicker. HC is a modern-day one room school house. The entire school is open to each other so there are no barriers between the classes. There is no water source and there is a hole in the back corner for kids to use for their latrine. The front of the school is a bridge over an open sewer. And there isn’t much in front of the school and only one lady selling any sort of snack or food for the kids.

So there’s some huge differences. Oasis is adequately staffed and HC isn’t. Oasis has separate rooms for classes while HC has every class hearing every other class, causing huge distractions. One of schools has water – for drinking (especially when schools get hot) and washing their hands and one doesn’t. There are latrines at Oasis so students are able to go to the bathroom cleanly while HC basically uses a spot in the back of the school. Not sanitary. One school benefits from being in a high-income area while the other is in the middle of one of the poorest areas within the metro area. Big differences.

While all of the schools in my study are lacking many things that ‘we’ (North Americans) think are vital to have in order to have a positive, effective, nurturing school environment they don’t have them here and still kids learn. And they love learning and they love being in school. I guess I am just amazed at the resilience of these kids and that they will sit in a hot, crowded, noisy room every day without eating or drinking anything just to learn some grammar.