Support Indigenous Students in the Face of COVID19

Dear Friends and Supporters

We hope you are in good health and that you´ve had a great start into the new year. Here in Peru, Omicron is on the rise, but fortunately its health impact does not seem as strong as in the previous two COVID waves. Close to 70% of the Peruvian population is now fully vaccinated.  

The 2021-I academic semester of our local public university, the UNAP, ended in November, so the indigenous students of the OEPIAP have been on vacation since then. However, the new semester, the second one of 2021, is just starting now. (The studies are still half a year behind schedule due the pandemic)

During their vacations, many students traveled to their communities to see their families.At the same time, new young applicants arrived at the city of Iquitos and the OEPIAP with the dream to continue their studies and enter university or a technical college. So far, more than 30 youth has arrived, and more are likely to come over the next two months, preparing for the admission exams.

Chaikuni has been supporting the young students all along the way with extra tutoring classes in a range of subjects. Until the end the year, we had offered 53 classes of Basic Mathematics, 28 classes of Advanced Mathematics, 27 classes of Physics, 21 classes of Statistics, 5 classes of Chemistry, and 25 classes of Mathematics for applicants. Now we are coordinating the start of the academic tutoring for the new semester.

In November, the Organization of the Indigenous Students (OEPIAP) organized a series of activities to celebrate their 18 years of institutional life. The anniversary event included conversations on indigenous youth and higher education, sports, puppet theaters, traditional dance, and singing and beauty contests. These types of events promote reflection on identity, integration, and a sense of belonging to the organization. Chaikuni was present to support in different ways, as presenters, jurors, allies, and friends.

Also in November, we organized an important audiovisual workshop with indigenous women and female students at the facilities of our permaculture center, in the rainforest outside of Iquitos. The product of this 4-day event is a short film with testimonies of indigenous, addressing many of the challenges and problems they face. We thereafter visited six Kukama communities along the lower Marañon River, with the protagonists of the short film, where we screened the movie and encouraged discussions on gender.

And finally, we have some more exciting news to share. Our project with the indigenous students was elected by GlobalGiving as project of the month for this month of February, from a pool of more than 5,000 nonprofit projects in 170+ countries. We are honored and very grateful for this selection, which gives us new motivation and some important additional funding to keep doing what we do.

Thanks so much for your continuous support to the indigenous youth in Iquitos, and for the trust in the Chaikuni Institute to accompany them. You help us keep going.

With much gratitude and optimism,

The Indigenous Students of OEPIAP and The Chaikuni Institute Team

Dear Friends and Supporters

We hope this report from the field finds you all well. Although the COVID-19 vaccination efforts in Peru are progressing faster than expected, the indigenous population is a particularly difficult group to reach. This month, however, the government’s vaccination campaign targeted OEPIAP, and 35 young students decided to get their first dose. This situation slowly allows the return to some normality.

In the previous report, we briefly mentioned some of the exciting upcoming activities, such as the "canoa cinema" event and the indigenous women's workshop where the young female students of the OEPIAP were going to participate.

With more than 100 people joining the event and attentively watching the movies from their canoes, the “canoa cinema” was a great success. The young indigenous students who participated as directors, producers, and protagonists in several short films, had the opportunity to present themselves and their products on this extraordinary stage: an outdoor venue in the Belén neighborhood in Iquitos, which at this time of the year is entirely flooded. So, the only way to attend this event was by boat. The students spoke about the importance of making visible the problems faced by the indigenous population, especially young students, and women. The young women, some of whom also made their own short film, took the opportunity to raise their voices about the violence exerted against indigenous women, the prevailing machismo that they experience, and the difficulties that this causes in their current trajectories of studying in the city of Iquitos.

Shortly after this event, June 10to 13, a group of these young female students from the OEPIAP also participated in the empowerment workshop of Indigenous Women's Organizations, organized by the Chaikuni Institute. They were joined by four local women's organizations: Huayna Kana Kamatahuara Kana, Organization of Indigenous Women of the Marañón (ORDEMIM), Association of Indigenous Women of Saramuro (AMISAM) and Federation of Women Artisans of Loreto (FEMIAL), representing a total of 28 indigenous women. The objective of this workshop was to empower these indigenous female leaders on the personal, community and political levels. Shortly after the workshop, OEPIAP’s female students had a presentation meeting with the National Organization of Andean and Amazonian Indigenous Women of Peru (ONAMIAP) in July, where they agreed to hold workshops during the last quarter of this year, creating a growing and ever stronger network of indigenous female leaders.

Furthermore, in July, the OEPIAP held elections for a new board of directors 2021-2023. Two candidate lists were presented, one led by a Ticuna woman, Leonarda Suárez Guerrero. The latter went on to win the elections, becoming the first female president of the organization since its creation in 2003. Our team is assisting the students in the transition process from the old to the new leadership, providing support with formalities and offering organizational training to the new – young and yet unexperienced – board members.

In the end of July, coinciding with the start of classes for the 2021-1 semester of UNAP, the local university, we resumed our reinforcement classes which we continue to this day. In total, Chaikuni has offered 10 Advanced Mathematics sessions, 10 Physics sessions, 20 Basic Mathematics sessions, and 8 Statistics sessions. In addition, 18 Mathematics sessions have been offered for young applicants to the university. We also continue with our constant personal academic monitoring and follow up of the students. As part of our activities to promote micro-entrepreneurship, we furthermore held 5 Business Plans workshops in which 6 indigenous youths participated. Likewise, 2 students, Gimena and Jose, are doing their pre-professional internships in the Permaculture program of our Institute. And finally, accompanied by our team, 2 more young people managed to obtain scholarships over the last three months, resulting in a total of 9 young people from the OEPIAP with scholarships to date.

We couldn´t do all of this without you. Thank you for being a part of this. Thank you for supporting the indigenous students in Iquitos.

With gratitude,

OEPIAP and The Chaikuni Team

Links:

• News article about "canoa cinema"