La Esperanza Granada

Why the children need our help Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries in Latin America, which also has its effects on the education system. Although a National Education Plan was made in 2000 to work on educational insufficiencies, the there is still a lot of room for improvement. Walking around in Granada you see children on the streets, playing or helping their parents work. They sell sodas, bread and pastries. Schooldays only take place in the mornings or afternoons. Usually the younger children have classes in the mornings and the older ones in the afternoons. So it’s only half a day. On top of that, an average school year is only 200 days, a lot of which are public holidays. To go to school children wear a uniform and need basic school materials. Often their parents can’t afford this. Due to the lack of money most public schools may not have the materials to teach certain courses. They may lack desks or basic school books. Also classes are really big, there o...

Recently at La Esperanza we have launched our new learning centre initiative, with centres located in both Sabaneta and Escudo. Children attend our centres voluntarily before or after their school day and the theory behind this is that these extra couple of hours each day will not only help the children improve their progress at school, but also their confidence and abilities generally. For 3 hours every morning our volunteers teach English, and for 3 hours in the afternoon they teach a mixture of art, mathematics and Spanish. Both Marie, 22 from Germany and Blake, 20,  from the USA are English teachers in the centre and both previously worked in our initiative within Nicaraguan state schools. Marie are there many differences between working in the centre and the school? In my first week, I was in Pablo Antonio Cuadra school and there were 50 to 60 children in each class. It was a very different experience. Whereas here (in the learning centre) ...

This is the fourth in a series of profiles on our ayudantes. Ayudante means ‘assistant’, and it is the name we give to the young people receiving university scholarships through La Esperanza Granada. Alongside their studies, the ayudantes are long term interns who give 5 hours of their time every weekday to support La Esperanza Granada. Our ayudantes are so much more than assistants – they are critical to our success. In the following interview, we introduce Jerry, who is one of our ayudantes in the Jose de la Cruz Mena school. He teaches English to children between six to twelve years. Jerry is a cheerful person, is always smiling, and children are keen to work with him due to the fun and enjoyment they get from his classes. As he always says; the easiest way to keep the children’s attention is to entertain them. When did you hear about La Esperanza for the first time? More than two years ago from my friend and second cousin, Juan Carlos. He had already been working fo...