GRADUATION: CELEBRATING THE DIGNITY OF THE CHILDREN OF THE PRESCHOOL PROGRAM IN SABANA YEGUA (DOMINICAN REPUBLIC) 

During the Summer, 45 children graduated from the preschool programs in La Sagrada Familia Parish. We celebrated a formal graduation ceremony (even though the children are very young) to recognize the participation of these kids in the program and their educational advances during the last year, and also to bid them farewell, since in September they will move on to primary school. Our children’s preschool program is conducted at three sites throughout the parish (in the towns of Sabana Yegua, El Ganadero and Los Negros) and it provides initial education for 180 children, from two to five years of age. The little ones go daily to the centers, where they receive education, a nutritional balanced diet (breakfast and lunch) and medical monitoring. Importantly, the preschool program also requires the active participation of their parents. This involvement of the parents includes not just getting the children to and from the school, but also attending meetings and talks about subjects like health and nutrition.

The children in this program of preschool childcare come from families of scarce means who live in marginal towns and settlements within the parish. The poverty and need in which these families find themselves seems at times to strip away their dignity. To conduct a well-organized, formal graduation was a way to restore a bit this dignity, at times lost due to their adversities. The parents came to the graduation dressed elegantly and participated with pride in the different activities, while the children were showing off proudly all of their advances. We hope that these children grow with confidence and the dignity necessary to be good men and women in our society.

Do You Know How to Read? “un chín”

This is what an eight year old boy in the little community of La Altagracia, located in the southwest of the Dominican Republic, answered me recently. “Un chín” means “a little” and is a very typical Dominican expression. This particular little boy wanted to become a member of the new library we have started in his village. Although he hardly knew how to read, we accepted him, since it wouldn’t be long until he has learned. In the meantime, his mom and dad will read with him the books he gets out of the library.

A few weeks ago we inaugurated the Altagracia Library, that for now, consists of a big box full of children’s books, kept at the home of one of the young people of the community. It is the seventh in a chain of mini libraries that we are creating to promote reading for all ages, but especially among children in the region. We have been able to establish these libraries thanks to multiple donations, the last of them from the companies DHL and Ordesa Laboratories, and from several friends in Barcelona. The central one, that now has more than 600 members, is located in La Sagrada Familia parish in Sabana Yegua (Azua), where the project originated. Others are cabinets or closets in chapels in rural communities... and where there isn’t a chapel, the library is a book box in the home of a volunteer who looks after it, as in the case of La Altagracia.

WE ARE ACTORS

“He who moves his body moves his heart; he who moves his heart, moves his emotions; he who is capable of becoming excited and is capable of exciting has found the key to the mystery-miracle of education,” (Carlos Pons, teacher and actor).

Following these beautiful words of Carlos Pons, the educators at Centro Comunitario de Desarrollo Infantil San José (St. Joseph Community Center for Child Development) in El Ajusco (México), played a dramatic and theatrical game with the children during the first trimester of the year, reenacting situations actually lived by these children. For example, a conflict on the playground or in the classroom would be portrayed by the children themselves.

The goal was to help the children understand their feelings and be able to name them. In this way, little by little, they learn to relate with one another and with the outside world in a more satisfactory and positive way.

To play a role produces changes in attitudes and conduct, promoting better comprehension toward the people who surround them.  In this way, they are being how to overcome obstacles in order to be happier in life.

Some of the students yelled enthusiastically, “We are actors!”

Understanding the Process of Family Reintegration of the Children of Casa San José (Cochabamba, Bolivia)

Editor's Note: Recently, several Agora XXI blog entries have acquainted our readers with the background and present activities at Casa San José in Bolivia.  The present article gets to the hopeful heart of the matter: reuniting the children with their families in conditions that improve the likelihood of successful family life, and some of the difficulties encountered.

Casa San José has, as its principal goal, the reintegration of street children and adolescents from Cochabamba into their families.  In dealing with agencies that take in minors (such as in our situation with street children), and which pursue their reintegration into their families, the Bolivian government asks through the Children and Adolescent Court that the families complete a series of requirements and thereby demonstrate that they are suitable for the return of the children.  As part of the process the Casa San José social worker prepares a status report and tries to explain to the children about the legal proceedings that, at times, can be complex and involve many, seemingly endless, steps in Children’s Court. This formal process often delays the assimilation of children. Therefore the children, despite our patient efforts to explain all of this to them, are often bewildered, frustrated and demoralized.

DONATION OF BOOKS FOR THE "MINI-LIBRARIES" IN THE AREA OF AZUA (Dominican Republic)

The project to have "mini-libraries" in La Sagrada Familia Parish in Sabana Yegua keeps growing. There are currently two small libraries, one with 500 members and the other with 75.  In 2013, five more mini-libraries will be established in different rural communities in the region in order to promote reading among the children through the lending of books.  We thank FUNDEBIDO, Editorial Santillana and Editorial SM for their recent donations of books to promote reading in this part of the Dominican Republic. 

COURSE END IN THE SAN JOSÉ CENTER IN JARDINES DE SAN JUAN, EL AJUSCO (MEXICO D.F.)

The San José Center closed the year’s course with a graduation ceremony for the children.  Each year, when a group’s time in the center has come to an end in order to be able to continue onto primary school, we realize that those children have overcome a challenge, they’ve reached a new step. And in the San José Center, the teachers are left with the sensation of “mission completed.”  They see generations of these little ones pass by, but that won’t be forgotten.  Generations of boys and girls full of joy, innocence and much imagination.  Some day they will think back on their childhood and on the San José Center, which we hope they will remember as a time full of joy and care on the part of their teachers.  As the Spanish psychiatrist and author Enrique Rojas says, “Almost all of that which is human is in the childhood.  When this stage has been happy, healthy, full of affection and well focused, one comes out strong for everything.” 

25 HAITIAN CHILDREN RECEIVE BIRTH CERTIFICATE

None of us worry much about existing legally in our country.  At our birth, our parents had us registered and we immediately had an identity as citizens - the government knows we exist and what family we come from.  But this is not the case for the children of undocumented Haitians born in the Dominican Republic.  Dominican laws do not extend Dominican nationality to them.  While some countries maintain the right to citizenship based on soil (territory), other do not.  The Dominican Republic falls into the second. The regretable consequence of this is that day by day the majority of children born in the DR to undocumented Haitians parents have no country that recognizes them, as their parents do not go to the Haitian consulates for fear of being deported.  Thus, legally, these children do not exist.

From within La Sagrada Familia Parish, we are now collaborating the the Haitian Consulate closest to Sabana Yegua (Barahona), in order to register children under the age of three.  This collaboration is the fruit of two years of negotiations and relationship building with the consulate, and organizing within the Haitian community in the parish. 

At the end of June 2013 we were able to obtain the first 25 birth certificates emitted by the Republic of Haiti.  This means that 25 children who did not exist to any country now have documentation... this is a big first step.  Hopefully, some day there will be more flexibility in the Dominican inmigration laws and they will be able to obtain recognition from not only the country where their parents were born, but also from the one where they were born, grew up, and will work. But there is a long way to go. 

"DÍA DEL NIÑO" IN THE SAN JOSÉ COMMUNITY CENTER, MEXICO CITY.

April 30 was the celebration of the Día del Niño (literally "Day of the Child") in the San José Community Center. In Mexico, the Día del Niño commemorates the Declaration of Children's Rights in 1959. 

Every day, 70 children come to this center located in El Ajusco, in the outskirts of Mexico City.  The center provides them with pre-school education, breakfast, lunch and medical care. 

In the Center there are also periodic talks with the fathers and mothers regarding reinforcing their children's education.  One topic that commonly emerges is domestic violence.  

On this occasion, the Center wanted to throw a nice party to commemorate the right of the children to have a happy childhood.  For this, the teachers dressed as clowns and organized a fair with different booths.  One was dedicated to makeup, where the children painted themselves as gatas, mice and Spider Man.  Another had a balloon game where they could win prizes.  And there was a dace floor.  

Later, the organizers hung up a large piñata full of candy.  After several falled attempts (as it should be!), finally the children were able to break it and all of them quickly filled their pockets.  For the gran finale, the cook had prepared an exceptional menu: pizza, natural fruit juice and horchata (a rice drink). 

It was a beautiful way to celebrate and highlight the rights of the smallest ones among us.