Project Schoolhouse

People and Persistence: 15 years of Push

December 17, 2021 By Project Schoolhouse

Project Schoolhouse Team surveying the Bilampi Water Project

“Endurance must master every fortune.” This is the advice that motivated Eneis to leave Sicily and cross the last tiny bit of water between him and Italy, the object of his long search. I remember reading this passage in the Java Moon coffee shop years ago in Sheridan, Wyoming. It became a mantra I would carry with me through the years since. Perhaps it felt familiar because it echoed what I’ve witnessed throughout my life in that small town and in many people and places beyond there.

I’ve been blessed with excellent role models. My mother once commented about my father that he ‘had a lot of push.’ If you ever had the chance to stack sod with us in the snow in December on our small Wyoming farm, you’d know that she has just as much. I recognize it in the communities where we work in Nicaragua as well. It’s a big part of why I’ve always felt so comfortable there. That familiarity is an important factor in how we do our work.

It’s been fifteen years since Project Schoolhouse broke ground on our first school project in a very remote part of Nicaragua. We’ve been persistent in the years since then and have steadily continued building schools and water systems in that region. What’s notable is that we are doing it still today with the same Nicaraguan team we started with in 2007. The most important part is the people and without them and their determination and dedication, the difficult work we do would be impossible.

Directing a small nonprofit organization is draining and can exact a heavy financial, personal, and social cost. Ask anyone who has done it. At the same time, it is a beautiful life experience that I always recognized brought far more fulfillment and value into my life than it took.

In 2018, after 12 years of running Project Schoolhouse, I finally hit a wall and knew that something had to change. In a moment of total clarity, while driving to San Antonio for a job installing desks in a university building, I realized that it was time to step down and hand the leadership of Project Schoolhouse over to long-time board member Selina Serna.

In January of 2019, Selina took the reins of Project Schoolhouse as its new Executive Director and I became our Director of Operations. While her impact has been extensive and important, what I most admire is her tenacity, persistence, and obvious passion for the project.

This year, Selina and I received a humanitarian award from the Austin chapter of the United Nations for our work with Project Schoolhouse. I think it really is a recognition of the endurance that so many people have exhibited throughout these years to keep this project going. It takes endurance for Nicaraguan farmers to spend an entire year digging twenty miles of trench by hand to bring water to their families. It takes endurance for our team on the ground to figure out, year after year, how to move hundreds of tons of materials into projects accessible only by foot and by horse. And it is endurance that keeps our ever-growing team in the US working to raise the funds we need to pay for those projects.

I’m proud of this project and the people that make it go. I’m proud of my part in it and grateful for the dedicated people that lead it now. Project Schoolhouse is fifteen years old and is better positioned than ever to keep fulfilling our mission of delivering education and water projects to communities who are ready to step up and partner with us.

Gratefully,

Tab Barker

Project Update – December 2021

December 17, 2021 By Project Schoolhouse

In 2021, for the first year ever, we worked in three communities, two water projects, in the communities of Mancera Central and Bilampi, and one School project in the community of Malakawas. We also initiated a pilot After-School Club in the community of El Aulo! The projects will bring clean water and education to over 650 people!

Mancera Central Water Project: Benefiting 50 families
Currently completing the final suspension bridge, which will complete the water distribution system. The next item would be to build the latrines in each household!

Malakawas – School: Benefiting 60 families
School is complete except for hanging the classroom divider which is already constructed. We will be handing the keys to this new school in the next few days!

Bilampi – Water Project: Benefiting a community with 43 families, 2 schools, and a church

Spring Capture & Tank 100% are complete! The distribution system is 70% complete. There is 6.5 km more pipe to get into the ground. This will take two months to complete at this pace (100-150 meters per day). We estimate the water portion can be completed by early February and the latrines finished by March 2022.

A New After-School Program in El Aulo

July 12, 2021 By Project Schoolhouse

While we build school buildings, the Ministry of Education employs and pays the salary for the teachers and sets all curriculum requirements. Typically, one teacher tries to teach 40 children, grades 1-6, in the same classroom. Schools are under-resourced with inadequate materials, overcrowding, and no extra-curricular activities to keep students motivated and engaged. Widespread poverty, low levels of adult literacy and lack of economic activity necessitating an education are demotivating to school attendance.

We are currently piloting after-school programs to provide children with opportunities that encourage them to stay in school. The goal is to create healthy, dynamic, and stimulating environments that respond to students’ interests (i.e. sports, arts, academics, leadership and service, science, and technology) and develop core life skills to help them succeed in school and beyond. These programs are led by university student volunteers, providing role models for the younger children, strengthening the social fabric by mobilizing students, teachers, parents, and volunteers, as partners in development. The longer-term goals are to see increased school attendance, higher promotion rates and an increase in adult community engagement in the schools. We are particularly focused on providing female university student volunteers to lead the Clubs, providing female role models and encouragement to stay in school. Sequenced after a water system and school project, the Club has the opportunity to tutor the children who have fallen behind, helping them catch up in their studies and on a path towards educational success. The Club is so well received by the parents, teachers and children. Here is an update of the first session, from Norma, our Programs Coordinator extraordinaire!

“We start the opening of the club at 1 in the afternoon. Giving thanks to God for allowing us to be in the community together with the boys and girls, and to be able to start this new program with the aim of reducing school dropouts, also helping these children in their classes where they have more difficulty through these clubs.As we began, a moment of joy was shared with the little ones. You could see the happiness, playing and dancing among them. Having the presence of 35 boys and girls, from first grade to sixth grade, we divided them into two groups, Jasmina and Josseling working with the fourth, fifth, and sixth graders as they worked on the reinforcement of mathematics. In the beginning, a review was made of History, Spanish and Mathematics to see the level of knowledge they have and it was then that we realized that these children have difficulty in division and multiplication.

Something very important was in realizing that they do not know the multiplication tables, which would make the mathematical exercises easier. So, we began practicing the tables by making a flipchart to have in the section for practice. Cristian and I work with preschool, 2nd and 3rd grade school children who cannot read.

These children have great difficulty in writing and have not yet learned to read. The preschool and 1st-grade children were grouped together and enjoyed stories being read to them, with the books in the new storybook library.

I worked with the second and 3rd grade children. They have difficulty, they do not know all the letters, it is difficult for them to form words, I made cutouts of the letters of the alphabet on colored sheets so that the colorful letters catch their attention. They also have difficulty in Math, not everyone knows the numbers or multiplication tables. There was a moment when we were also playing with dynamic songs.

There is much to do with these children, and we hope we can achieve our goal to help them overcome the struggles that lead them to stop coming to school. You can see the difficulty the children have. I think it is because of the teacher’s time, she works with six grades together, so she does not have time to teach each grade individually.

These two days the participation and dedication of the children was excellent. They are enthusiastic and happy. You can see that they are interested in learning and practicing and excited about this opportunity. “

Le queremos agredecer a nuestra coordinadora, Norma Valdez por su trabajo con este proyecto.

Impact Report

July 12, 2021 By Project Schoolhouse

Despite persistently challenging conditions in Nicaragua, Project Schoolhouse has managed to keep moving forward with all of our planned projects for 2021.

For the first time ever, we are working in three communities simultaneously to bring water to over 90 families and a school to the community of Malakawas.

In the community of Mancera Central, the community has completed the spring capture and the main water line down to the water storage tank. This was a difficult capture process because the spring is located far up a steep mountain and the materials were difficult to transport by hand and horse. There are also a large number of suspension bridges needed to traverse complex geography down from the spring.

Using funds from a Global Grant from Rotary International, we are building a community water system in a community called Bilampi in the municipality of Bocana de Paiwas. Anchored by the West Austin Rotary Club in Austin Tx and the Matagalpa Rotary Club in Matagalpa, Nicaragua, this is a $90,000 grant that will cover 100% of the expenses for the project. This water system actually pulls water from three different springs, requiring three separate spring captures. As with Mancera Central, this community has finished trenching the main water line and is working on construction of the water storage tank.

Both Mancera Central and Bilampi should have water running to every home, school, and church in the communities by the end of 2021.

Last year we completed a water system in the community of Malakwas and this year we are working with the community to build a new elementary school. The project is going quickly and the metal superstructure, the floor, and the roof are now complete. The students in Malakawas will be able to finish this school year in a brand new school!

All in all, these three projects will touch the lives of over 150 families.

We are also thrilled to report that our first After-School Club is up and running and doing a great job of increasing the access for students in El Aulo to additional instruction and instructor attention. Twice a week the students get to stay an extra two hours to continue studying core subjects with local volunteers and Project Schoolhouse team members. We hope to implement this program in more schools as resources become available.

While continuing our work through the covid epidemic has been challenging, we’ve managed to continue to increase our impact and reach across all our projects and programs. Our teams have grown over the past two years both in Nicaragua and in the USA and this success is undoubtedly due to the hard work of these skillful team members as well as the donors who support this work.

Thank you to everyone.

-Tab
Director of Operations

The new elementary school under construction in Malakawas.

This is one of three separate spring captures in the community of Bilampi, Nicaragua. Water is flowing downhill to the water storage tank.

Greetings from the Executive Director

July 12, 2021 By Project Schoolhouse

Dear friends,

We’re excited to share project updates with you below, reporting on the three (yes, three!) projects currently underway, a record for Project Schoolhouse. I’m grateful to our team on the ground in Nicaragua who are really shining as they juggle all of the logistical and motivational challenges inherent in working in remote communities on projects built primarily by volunteer labor. I’m also grateful to Rotary International, the West Austin Rotary Club, and The Burdine Johnson, Still Water, Love, Tito’s and AMB Foundations for investing in these projects. By the end of the year, we will have collaborated to deliver clean water to two communities and built a new school at a third!

The two intrepid interns who were in Nicaragua at the beginning of the year are back in the US and sharing inspiring stories of their experiences, captured in the recap interview below. One fact we continue to see is that even after clean water and school projects are finished and are no longer obstacles to education, there is still a dropoff in the number of children in 4-6th grades, many less than started in the lower grades. I’ve been thinking a lot about how we might support communities to improve retention and graduation rates. To explore this area, we’ve initiated a pilot project in one community to listen to the challenges. We heard from the teacher that it is a challenge to single-handedly teach to a classroom of 40 children from first through sixth grade. Children get behind on their studies and there is no time to work with them individually. We’re seeing encouraging initial reports from Norma, our Programs Coordinator, and we wanted to share with you all one of those reports and the concept of the After-School Club. Have a read below and if you’re interested in discussing or learning more, please join us at one of our upcoming Crash Course info sessions. Details and RSVP links here!

We’ve been following the recent, oftentimes heartbreaking US border immigration news. One area we’ve been wanting to explore further are the root causes of migration, as we believe the infrastructure projects made possible by your investment in Project Schoolhouse tackles some of the first development needs that mitigate the need to migrate. To this aim, we are hosting a panel discussion of experts in this field and we invite you to join the conversation, July 22nd at 6 pm central time. You’ll hear from the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), an investigative journalist with the Texas Tribune and a professor at the University of Texas at Austin who studies the topic of root causes of migration. We hope you’ll join the conversation. Details and RSVP here!

None of this work would be possible without your support. To that end, we’re excited to announce Cien Amigos 2021, November 11, with both live, in-person in Austin, Texas AND virtual attendance options! This is our only fundraiser of the year and your help is crucial. For details on hosting a table or becoming an event sponsor, please see our website.

With gratitude and hope to see you soon!

Selina

Greetings from our Executive Director – Energized for the year ahead

April 12, 2021 By Project Schoolhouse

Dear Friends,

We are excited to have broken ground on a water and latrine project in the community of Mancera Central, returning to that community after collaborating to build a new school building in 2019. As its name suggests, it is the center of a group of smaller villages, with a high school and a health clinic that serves all of those surrounding villages. In these rural communities, high school occurs every Saturday and students take their homework for the rest of the week, to complete after they finish their chores. Going to high school is quite a commitment, walking or riding a horse for hours from the smaller villages to get to school. It was eye-opening and heart-warming to see the influx of teens that Saturday of our visit. Many of the girls were accompanied by moms or older brothers, for safety. It takes at least 5 years for them to graduate from high school, going only once a week as they do.

In 2019 the community mobilized to build a new school to serve as the primary school during the week, and the high school on Saturdays, just as they are now mobilizing to build a water system to provide safe drinking water for their families. It was the fastest school we’ve seen come together and that energy is continuing on the water project.

We are so very grateful for the support of The Burdine Johnson Foundation for financially supporting the Mancera Central water project. Their sustaining support over the years has brought safe water to hundreds of families.

We are also grateful and thrilled to report winning our second Rotary International Global Grant! This grant will pay for the water and latrine project in the community of Bilampi, which we will break ground on in early summer 2021. We’re excited to share an interview, below, of KC Cerny, the driving force behind these complex grant applications. In designing this system, our water engineer reported this community having the worst water quality he had ever seen. The families in Bilampi cannot wait to get started. They should have clean water in their homes by the end of the year!

And, in between these 2 water projects, we will collaborate in the community of Malakawas to build a new school, after finishing a water project there last year. In our survey work leading up to commencing this project, we’ve seen the highest level of adult continuing education of all of the communities we’ve worked in previously. It is great to see parents just as eager to continue their education as the children, and they cannot wait to have a new school building in which to study.

Your support makes all these projects possible. We invite you to one of our upcoming ‘Crash Courses’ to learn more about 2021 projects and the communities where we’ve put your investment to work. I hope to see you there and bring a friend or two to help us spread the word. It would be a huge gift.

Gratefully,
Selina Serna
Executive Director