In Haiti’s struggle to return to some normality and to heal the wounds caused by the earthquake, school is now considered a high priority. Children living in the streets and in provisional tent-settlements are traumatized and lost in this unprotected environment. Schools could give them at least some feeling of being cared for – say Haitian education officials.
Early care and education, as provided for deprived children through Montessori pre-schools, initiated by Haitian civil society groups with the support of the Peter-Hesse-Foundation had created islands of hope in Haiti.
In the areas affected by the earthquake, schools are destroyed. Surviving teachers from destroyed schools are now staying with the foundation’s Montessori teacher-trainers in Liancourt near St. Marc, outside of Port-au-Prince, in one larger Montessori country pre-school.
For new Montessori pre-schools, especially for earthquake victims among Haiti’s children, more teachers are needed. Therefore former Montessori teacher-students with only an “assistant”-diploma will be called to join the Liancourt provisional centre to be trained in a concentrated course, led by the foundation’s Montessori directress Carol Guy-James Barratt from Trinidad.
The next step will be to fund new beginnings. In view of the huge needs in this unfortunate country, funding will create new challenges. Montessorians and other friends in the world are most welcome to be part of this challenge.
Peter Hesse
Peter-Hesse-Foundation SOLIDARITY IN PARTNERSHIP for ONE world in diversity.
Are the Montessori-projects of the Peter-Hesse-Foundation for deprived kids in Haiti worth supporting?
AMI-president André Roberfroid wrote in the preface of Peter Hesse’s book “VISION WORKS. From vision to reality. From Haiti to ONE world in diversity.” (ISBN 978-3-9811650-2-9):
“In the slums of Haiti, at the end of the 20th century, Peter Hesse came to a conclusion exactly similar to that of Maria Montessori in the poor suburbs of Rome at the beginning of the century. As the President of the Association Montessori Internationale, I can only express my immense gratitude to Peter Hesse and to all his friends in Haiti, for giving us this marvelous example. As Maria Montessori said many times, ‘the child is the agent of change’. This book is a testimony to her vision.”