For an Education

What would any of us do to obtain an education? It's hard to imagine because many of us take a good public education for granted  - at least if we live in a city and state where K - 12 education is still publicly funded.  We imagine that the days of walking 6 miles each way to sit at a rustic desk in a one-room school house are a century behind us. They're not. Those days still exist, in countries like Ethiopia, Kenya, and Guatemala. We have sponsored students in each of those countries and each quarter their updates plant a seed of incredulity and awe in our hearts.

K, in Kenya, walked to school barefoot and overcame public sentiment against girls attending school to attend K - 8 grade. She made beaded bracelets to pay for textbooks and eventually boarding - financing her own way through the school for girls. She passed exams to qualify for high school and was sent to a school that suffered numerous setbacks last year. The principal / history teacher quit, leaving the students without a history teacher for three months. K did her best to study for the state exams on her own - which was difficult with the lack of oversight and the lack of textbooks (only 6 books for 46 students in her math class). When the school eventually found a nun to serve as principal, the other teachers went on strike for several weeks.  K's father and advocates are working to transfer K to a different school, but meanwhile she returns this month to the dysfunctional location. She writes that she will persevere on her journey.

W, in Guatemala, was unable to pass her courses and will have to repeat seventh grade. Her mother was ill last year and the whole family had to relocate from the countryside to the capital in order to find proper care. W and her siblings tried to go to school in Guatemala City, but their curriculum was disrupted and W found herself far behind when she returned to the John Wesley School near her home. She walks a distance each day to attend school and the tone of her letters is discouraged, but she writes my children to "study hard, especially in math and Science - they are important."

My children grumble about waking up early for class and we all grumble about homework. K and W are blessings to us because they remind us of the value of an education, and of how much children (especially girls) struggle around the world to go to school.  Our schools have rows of chrome books, shelves of paper books, and highly qualified and motivated teachers; we could not be more lucky. I hope that sense of gratitude and appreciation infuses all of our school days.