Haiti’s schools have reopened but many parents now cannot afford it

Port-au-Prince – School children in Haiti have missed school this year first due to months of violent unrest, then the Coronavirus pandemic. Now, with schools finally reopening, many parents can no longer afford them, increasing the likelihood of losing their hard-won gains in education.

“The deadline for payment is next Monday. I will not be able to attend class without paying,” said Nicerla Etienne, 16, after she was sent home from her private school in the capital, Port Ou. Prince, for failing to pay.

While the epidemic has disrupted education worldwide, the situation is particularly acute in Haiti, where it is estimated that only two-thirds of adults can read and write.

“We have never seen a crisis of this magnitude before,” said Beatrice Malebranche of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Haiti.

Virtual education was impossible for most Caribbean countries, with more than half of the population living on less than $ 3 a day and having little to no internet and television.

Meanwhile, given the weakness of the Haitian state, which has endured years of turmoil and mismanagement, and is still struggling to recover from the devastating 2010 earthquake, four out of five schools in the Caribbean country are private schools.

Although the fees are usually low, they have become prohibitively expensive for many as the pandemic exacerbates an already dire economic distress in Haiti.

Even families whose children have registered coveted public school places just struggle to purchase decent stationery or shoes.

Out of school, children risk entering the informal employment sector or, worse still, being recruited into Haitian gangs.

The Ministry of Education has little firepower to tackle the problem, with 11% of the total budget receiving down from 16%. The global average is 20% of total spending.

Spokeswoman Melody Vincent told Reuters she would provide financial aid to at least 50,000 of the most vulnerable families that would not go far in the country of 11 million people.

Malebranche said the situation was a setback after Haiti raised its primary school enrollment rate to 84% from 76% over the past decade.

There is no money for the teachers

While the Coronavirus has left Haiti relatively unscathed from a health standpoint, the Ministry of Education has issued instructions that staff and students wear masks. Schools should provide for hand washing, even if it’s just a bucket of water.

The government also ordered the most overcrowded schools to divide classrooms to ensure physical spacing and rotation of each in shifts of two to three days a week, raising concerns about the fact that they will offer fewer lessons per child.

Even so, the principals of five private schools in low-income areas visited by Reuters said only about half of their pupils had returned so far. Overcrowding is no longer a problem – so is school finances.

“I haven’t been able to pay the teachers’ salaries since March,” said Leonard Turin, principal of Pierre Fermat High School. “The state promised us some financial aid, but we have not received anything yet,” he added.

Chalk Firearms Trading

Experts say some schools that are already underfunded will likely close, as teachers switch to other professions.

Etienne’s father, Jackson Dorsey, 53, was a teacher himself, but in the 1990s he switched to working as a bodyguard because his school had not paid him for a year.

However, although he “replaced chalk with firearms,” and his wife runs a pharmacy, the economic situation is so bad that they are still unable to pay their daughter’s fees.

The turmoil of last year financially destroyed many businesses that were unable to stand on their feet before the coronavirus hit, while double-digit inflation is destroying household incomes and reducing remittances.

“Most of our customers owe us money,” said Dorsey, as she stood outside their one-room corrugated iron home. Like many parents, he said he would seek to negotiate fees with the school, or if he failed to request church handouts.

Some parents who cannot afford to send their children to school now may send them out next year – a practice that explains why so many Haitians reach their twenties before they graduate from high school.

Although the risk is that parents may never tolerate it.

Etienne, a passionate student, dreams of becoming an air hostess. For now, she should be content selling popcorn from her parent’s storefront.

(Reporting by Andre Boltrey in Port-au-Prince and Sarah Marsh, Havana; edited by Lisa Schoomaker)

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