Help 80 Secondary Pupils in Niger Read and Write

CALL FOR HELP ANSWERED BY NEW TUTORING PROGRAM

 We are proud to announce that after much reflection and active hard work, we have innovated a personalized tutoring program to answer our students’ cries for help and to avoid student dropout.

 Here is some background:

 Our Scholarship students coming to Hampaté Bâ School from public primary schools with classes of 80-100, often have a hard time adjusting to a new level of education, even though classes at Hampaté Bâ are much smaller. They arrive with a basic level of French which is very low, since it is not their mother tongue and not spoken at home. They essentially arrive in 6th grade with the enormous problem of not knowing how to read and write in French, a language which is not their own, but the language of their education.

 We witness the students’ incrediblestruggle to learn all subjects,since they are not proficient in reading and writing. It keeps them from studying and has a direct influence on their behavior. Low self-esteem and clowning become the result of poorly stimulated brains. Too many students leave middle school because of this.

 We hear these calls for help:

 “My son’s teacher says that my child talks too much in class, that his schoolwork is untidy and that he can’t complete assignments in the given time and none of his exercises are completed. Also, he copies information incorrectly from the blackboard and sometimes nothing at all. Can you please help my son? He wants to get an education, but he needs help. I cannot help him. I’m illiterate and I have four other children to take care of.”       

 “The principal says nothing makes sense when my daughter Charifa writes because she cannot read. And yet Charifa wants to become a nurse, help other people and help us.”

 “I can’t understand any of my math lessons. At home, there is no one to help me because my parents don’t know how to read and write. Sometimes, my neighbors try to help, but they are not always there, so I try to find a way myself and I get bad grades.”

 Les Amis de Hampaté Bâ did not turn a deaf ear to these pleas coming both from the parents and the students. There was a need for action and action we took.We are presently offering an after school remediation program to tutor underprivileged boys and girls privately and in very small groups.

 This is by no means an easy task. Teachers have to go back and do Grade 1 work again, even though a child might be in Grade 7 or 8. We have put these remediation classes together to help the students individually. For example, the Math Teacher does individual exercises with each student and corrects the exercises with them on the spot. The French teacher is able to help each student out according to their motivation and pay particular attention to each one according to their level of understanding and stimulate them so they can fully reap the benefits of this individual attention.

 When students make improvements in basic Reading, Writing, French and Math Skills, improvement in grades is seen across all other subject matters and that boosts the students’ self esteem and increases their motivation. The results of this program are certainly encouraging and families are very grateful for what we are doing.

 But it is not only our non-profit and the teachers who are striving to make this program work. The students themselves are making enormous efforts to attend the classes in order to better their education and raise their level, since it is so precious and vital to them. Some of them walk long distances of 1 hour or more by foot in more than 40 degree weather to attend these late afternoon classes because as one of them put it: “They have given me this chance. I am not letting it go!"

 Through this remediation program, we have discovered that our disadvantaged students relish the opportunity to get a proper education. They feel there is hope. As expressed by Zalika :

“Thanks to my private tutoring, I am understanding my studies better and am raising my level little by little. I want to improve my level and go to high school.”

It’s not evident to be a child living in the 4th poorest country in the world and to have opportunities for a quality education. We thank you for continuing to support our literacy and numeracy programs and to give these underprivileged students a chance for a better future.

Let them learn !

 Your donations make a big difference and we need them to continue helping these students and prevent early dropout.

 THANK YOU !