Recovering the School Year in Pisco

Posted: 2 November 2007

by Maribel Sánchez

Emergency classrooms built by Oxfam International help students get back to school.

As the rebuilding effort continues after the August 15 earthquake in Peru, parents and their children are now struggling to restart the school year in Pisco. There is widespread fear for the safety of children attending damaged schools, and many parents say they would prefer their children miss an entire year than be injured or killed in an unsafe building.

“People are still afraid, and do not want to send their children to our school,” said Máximo Escobar Peralta, director of Colegio Santísima Vírgen Inmaculada Concepción in Pisco. “Many parents are asking for its demolition, and our students have gone to other schools,” he explained.

Isabel Solano, leader of Oxfam’s temporary shelter program in Pisco, said she had visited many schools and found that there was a significant demand for classrooms. “Many students still attend classes in damaged rooms that have been declared uninhabitable,” she said.

The Peruvian Ministry of Education has delivered pre-built classroom modules to restart classes after an almost two-month pause. However, there are not enough to go around. Many schools, like Colegio Santísima Virgen Inmaculada Concepción, do not have enough new classroom modules, and its sixth grade is now meeting in a room with cracked walls.

Oxfam International is currently supplying 75 emergency classrooms built of bamboo and 16 semi-permanent, prefabricated rooms as part of its temporary shelter program. These classrooms will help 7,000 students in Humay, Independencia, and Pisco to restart their education. Students in primary, secondary, and adult education programs are attending classes in three shifts: morning, afternoon, and evening.

“These emergency classrooms provide students with adequate space to attend classes in better and more secure conditions,” said Oxfam’s Solano. Oxfam’s emergency classrooms will also contribute to improving student attendance.

“There have been days when only six out of the 30 students in my class attended school,” said Teodora Cayhualla Carrazco, a sixth-grade teacher at Colegio Santísima Vírgen Inmaculada Concepción.

Emotions Recover in Schools

Schools dedicated the first week of classes after the quake to the students’ emotional recovery. Schools offered psychological support, and called on students and their families to remain calm and move forward. All of this worked, the teachers explained, to make the students feel a little better.

“We made drawings about what happened, how we lived it, what we felt. We visualized how we are now,” said Cinthia Salazar Martínez, a student at Colegio Independencia who hopes to study fashion design.

“We are happy to be back in school. In our homes, we were bored and scared. We are not bored anymore, but still a bit scared because we heard there will be a tsunami,” explained Meribeth Cutte Paredes, an 11-year-old sixth-grader who lives in San Andres, a district close to the sea.

Teachers in the schools are struggling to keep their classes in session, said Rosa Lleren from the alternative basic education center CEBA-Bandera del Perú.

“We are adapting to these conditions. We hold classes in pre-built classrooms erected in the schoolyard, and we have no blackboards,” she said. “The lack of electricity affects us, especially for the evening students who only take classes until sunset, which means they miss about two class hours a day.” Oxfam will install nine emergency classrooms in this school that will be used for the three shifts of students attending classes there. Each room will have its own blackboard.

After the earthquake many things have changed. Many students will not have their graduation ball, or athletic events.

“We were going to Cusco for our graduation trip but our plans have changed,” said Evelyn Neyra, a fifth-grader from Colegio Independencia. “Everything we have saved will be used to rebuild our homes.”

“Now all our efforts are directed to recovering the school year,” explained. Carlos Hernández, director of Colegio Los Libertadores 2244 in the town of Dos Palmas. “That’s why we are having classes on Saturdays and holidays--to complete the curriculum. Recovering lost time is our priority. That is why classes will extend until January 2008, one month after the end of the regular school year in Peru.”

In the middle of so many needs and so much sorrow, there are moments of consolation. On October 17, Colegio Bandera del Perú received a delegation of students and teachers from Colegio Peruano Británico, a private school from Arequipa.

“We come here to give emotional support,” said Felipe Queufeld, one of the visiting students. “We are bringing theater, games, and songs to share with students from several schools affected by the earthquake. We are also giving every student a breakfast kit consisting of sugar, oatmeal, milk, noodles, and rice.”

Students from Colegio Bandera del Perú cannot hide their happiness with this visit. They play with the visiting students, take photos, and exchange e-mail addresses. It is a moment of joy in the midst of pain, showing how Peruvians, with the firm decision to move ahead, express their solidarity.