Newsletter 02 -
February 2007
NewsletterFeb07.pdf
Content:
Model School:
- End of 2006
- A new Face
- Portraits
- News and Projects
Village Schools:
- Teachers Training
- Confusion
in the
villages
The Farm
Model School
End of 2006
The year 2006 ended in harmony and after Christmas, which was
celebrated in a very peaceful way, the children started to look forward
to seeing their families again.
Candles, self-made decoration and the sweet smell of cake created a
warm and comfortable atmosphere, which was enriched by two of our
volunteers who performed Christmas songs on the flute.
On Christmas Eve we also celebrated Maheswari’s birthday (see
portrait). As all the parents of our children are illiterate farmers,
neither our pupils nor our teachers know their date of birth. So we are
making up our own birthday calendar for the school- children, teachers,
helpers and started with the first birthday celebration on Christmas
Eve. We put those two events together to avoid giving more importance
to Christmas than to tribal or Hindu festivals.
After a New Year’s Eve with tribal dances, the children went to their
villages for the harvest festival and stayed with their families for
one month.
A new face
In November another volunteer joined the Balamitra team.
Kristina is an experienced Waldorf teacher and an inspiration for the
younger staff members. She is taking a year off from her work at a
German Waldorf school, “not only for traveling but also to work in a
social project” she says.
In her weekly training sessions she introduces how to teach in the
Waldorf way.
Not only Balamitra staff benefits from the training, even teachers from
Jasver School, Vishakhapatnam, take part in the meetings as their
school is adopting some Waldorf ideas to give their students a more
creative education.
For the tribal teachers Kristina provides regularly English training as
well, so that they can improve their skills in the language.
Kristina will stay with us till April.
Portraits
To offer you a more personal look at our children we
will
write a short profile of two students in every newsletter.
Prashant – A seven
year
old boy from the Valmiki tribe, is agile and
likes to dance and sing. Everyone loves his pranks and jokes. One can
never miss him, this bright-eyed boy full of mischief. He comes from a
family of four children. His father is an activist with the local
community organization called Adivasi Mitra and he helps his community
on development needs and in fighting the exploitation of traders,
moneylenders and non-tribals. The family income is Rs.15,000 (US $340
)annually.
Maheswari – A soft
spoken
nine year old girl from Kamay-yapeta village,
Visakhapanam district. Having lost both her parents as an infant, she
was brought up by the community. She came to us very malnourished
and
ill, having never attended a school. First she found it difficult to
keep pace with the others in her lessons but in almost two years at
Balamitra she steadily improved her involvement. We also managed to
create a home for her and to bring joy to her timid face.
News and Projects
If you had visited us in the last week you probably would have been
crossed by some pigs, parrots and other animals. But don’t worry: It’s
just the class V Balamitra students wearing their
paper-mâché masks.
The children tinkered them by sticking pieces of paper on balloons. The
details of the different faces were shaped with
paper-mâché and painted with watercolors.
Studiously the children will work on various other small items as the
annual School Bazaar is approaching: Therefore everybody is kindly
invited to visit our school on the 27th of March from 4 to 7 pm to get
your personal picture of everyday life at Balamitra School. For more
details about the School Bazaar contact the Balamitra team.
While class V was busy with the masks, the class II children were
building toy mud-houses with ovens. They even cooked proper meals – but
with small accidents!
Talking about cooking, we also have to mention that we tasted the first
pot of rice from the solar oven.
At the moment the Balamitra students of class II and V are exploring
some parts of their own identity in their Geography epochs. While class
II is looking at the different tribal festivals, class V is learning
about tribes from all over India. Because of this they are
planning to write a complaint to the President of India as they are
getting aware of the problems they have to face, not only in Andhra
Pradesh, but in other states as well.
Another highlight for the children in this term was the recording of
their traditional songs. All India Radio staff visited Balamitra Model
School twice to tape their performance. The children were very proud
and astonished as they could listen to their own voices on the radio.
We also had a visitor from Germany over Christmas – our volunteer Flo’s
mother and we thank her for her contribution to the school.
Village Schools
Teachers Training
By the end of the year two Teachers Trainings were held, not at the
Model School like the last one, but in some of the villages in which a
Balamitra school is located. Teachers from neighboring villages came
together in small groups and exchanged new teaching methods. The
meetings were led by two teachers from the Model School and the
Balamitra Field Coordinator. As the majority of children in the village
schools are 5 to 7 years old, the new methods taught to the teachers
were focused on younger pupils.
In some other villages children and parents with support from AID
finished building new huts as we had only treetops as shelter for our
classes so far.
Confusion in the villages
Confusion in the villages was created by the Government of Andhra
Pradesh, which recently declared a few of the Balamitra Schools as
Government Schools. But the declaration didn't change any of the
praxis. The promised teachers did not attend, so that the Balamitra
Schools continue to depend on the mere help of supporters. A difficult
situation, especially as a major supporter of Balamitra is going to
step down at the end of April.
The Government also fails to support our children through the “Midday
Meal Program,” which was initiated by the World Bank to offer
underprivileged children proper nutrition. All of our schools fall into
the “acting area” of the Program, but at some point the chain is
interrupted and so far no food has been delivered to any of our
schools. The Government emphasize that primary education is a
fundamental right to every child, but now it is not walking the talk.
Contrary to their statement the Government has just declared that it
will close all their schools, which have less than 20 students. This
means two things for the Balamitra Schools: Firstly the demand for our
schools will increase and secondly the Governmental support, which
ironically only exists on paper anyway will be cut for most tribal
villages in the state, as very few of them have more than 20 children.
The Farm
It was the first step on the way to a dream of many members, when
Samata bought a 9,5 acres piece of land, in the untouched forest area
near Visakhapatnam in August 2003. Now the dream starts to get a
clearer shape:
“The vision is to centralize all sections of Samata in one place, the
offices, the accommodation for members, their families, friends and
volunteers and the Balamitra Model School” says Ravi Rebbapragada,
Executive Director of Samata.
For the Balamitra kids this would mean that they could learn in a
beautiful, natural surrounding, with bigger classrooms and frequent
lessons outdoors. They might get some new classmates too, as the intake
capacity of the school would increase with the move.
Due to the support of friends and good contacts more detailed planning
could start soon. We hope that the first stone will be laid by the end
of 2007, but our pace depends on the generosity of our supporters.
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Christmas Eve at Balamitra Model
School
Kristina inaugurates the
new fridge,
a gift from the Waldorf Schools
in Germany
Meeting in one of the
Villages
A temporary building on the farm
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