Help Revolutionize Education For Peruvian Children

Thank you for your donations! Your contributions have helped Enseña Perú to reach more students throughout the country, which means a life changing opportunity for them. The classroom experience is also benefiting and motivating young professionals that will be able to invest their skills in the improvement of our educational system in the near and long term future. Throughout this year we have been receiving more stories from our teachers and students, which we would love to share with you.

As you might know, our mission involves pursuing a positive increase not only in the purely academic abilities of our students, but also in their soft skills which includes aspects such as self-confidence and teamwork, as well as applying their critical skills to their own realities. A great example of this is brought to us by the powerful story of Reymi Vereau Reyes, one of our fellow teachers who is currently working in “La Libertad” province.

Reymi became a teacher in a primary school located in a small rural area called “El Inca”. She and her 23 second graders became  a small family. Their class consists of ten boys and thirteen girls that have been working hard to achieve their goals since the moment Reymi arrived. Reymi calls them The Geniuses of “El Inca”. One of those geniuses is Luis Angel, who is ten years old and is the most outgoing boy in the class.

At the beginning of the year, Luis Ángel had a lot of difficulties in his learning process. Reymi remembers the day when her students were reading a story aloud one by one;  when it was Luis Angel’s turn, he stood up very bravely in front of all of his classmates and said out loud “I don’t know how to read or write, Miss.” And then he sat down. His honesty made three other students dare to speak up about having the same problem. After congratulating each of the boys for being courageous, Reymi committed herself to work with them so that this year could be a different one for them, a year in which they could overcome their fears and victoriously learn to read and to write.

It has not been an easy journey, but at the end of the year Reymi believes that each child has been moving forward at their own pace and they have all improved a lot. To this day, all 23 children can read and write fairly well. In Luis Ángel’s case, who comes from a dysfunctional family which deals with various forms of violence, reaching his goal has been a very personal achievement. It is due to his own efforts and his own decision to stop being just the “class clown” that he was able to improve that much. Last June, Luis Angel’s mother, who was pregnant, got sick to the point of being hospitalized; for this reason, he was basically abandoned for a month and a half. His sister had to leave school in order to take care of her mother, and his father was unemployed. Therefore, Luis Angel had to leave school as well. In this way, he was able to work for his grandfather taking care of his animals in exchange for food. Given that he was absent from schools for a month, the teachers and the other children had no hope that Luis Angel would return.

Although there were many times in which the parents had been contacted to motivate them to bring Luis Angel back to school, the mother’s sickness, the new baby and the situation as a whole were bringing a lot of difficulties to the household. However, Luis Angel told one of his friends that he wanted to come back to continue his studies… and he did! Since the day he returned he made sure not to miss any more classes and put in a lot of effort to catch up with the rest. Everytime he struggled or made a mistake, he learned from it. Yet, sometimes he still feels frustrated and angry when he cannot understand a concept right away; in those moments, he proves that he has learnt one of the biggest lessons: To not give up and to breathe deeply  in order to calm down.

Now Luis Angel knows the multiplication tables and he is even one of the first volunteers to write and read aloud in class. In fact, he has become the most acclaimed by his peers when participating in the “I am the teacher” dynamic. He has learnt to share his learning, motivation and drive to be more autonomous with all his classmates. He has the capacity to think outside the box and search for improvement in everything that is around him. This is Luis Angel, a smart, unique, outgoing, cheerful and loving boy  that also has dreams and aims for the future. He dreams of being a pilot when he grows older, and Reymi hopes that the rest of his teachers keep motivating him to learn and to deal with his difficulties in the best way possible in order to keep fighting for his dreams.

Just as Luis Angel was able to break through the shell that was keeping him behind, more children like him should be able to have access to a better education that allows them to flourish. What do you think? Can we keep spreading these values and excellent education throughout different parts of the country? We believe it’s possible! We want to transform more lives through caring and quality education and your contribution will help us continue this work. Thank you so much for your contribution!