A Thirst For Knowledge In The Absence Of Learning Facilities!

“Our children exceeded the school age as public schools are more than half and hour’s walk from here. We couldn’t wait any longer. We had to look for any unfinished building in the area to be a place of study. At that point, it didn’t matter to us if our children would sit on the floor without chairs, or exposed to the sun, wind, and rain … all what we needed for our children is to be educated,” Anisa Ali Mohammed, school principal.

Background:

Habeel Salman area, Sabir Al-Mawadim district, Taizz, school-aged children have a burning desire to follow their dreams despite poverty, displacement, or any other barrier that may step in their way, yet the absence of learning facilities in the area hampers children from acquiring knowledge.

During the 2011 Yemeni Revolution in Taizz, hundreds of people had been displaced from the city of Taizz to the neighboring areas, Habeel Salman area in particular. Adding fuel to the fire, the war in Yemen aggravated the situation and increased the number of displaced families all over the country, including Taizz governorate.

As a result of the higher displacement, the affected families in Habeel Salman area have been struggling with education services ever since. Children commute every day to study in temporary learning spaces belonging to private owners.

These structural buildings have no walls, doors and educational materials not to mention the loud noise made by pupils of different grades who are studying together in one floor. From the first grade to the sixth, children study back-to-back with nothing to separate the classes which definitely distracts pupils’ attention to learn and understand. Unfortunately, public schools are away too far, and parents cannot afford paying fees to private schools as well.

“Our children exceeded the school age as public schools are more than half and hour’s walk from here. We couldn’t wait any longer. We had to look for any unfinished building in the area to be a place of study. At that point, it didn’t matter to us if our children would sit on the floor without chairs, or exposed to the sun, wind, and rain … all what we needed for our children is to be educated,” Anisa Ali Mohammed, school principal.

By the efforts of affected residents in the area during 2013, Ali Ahmed Az Zailai School has been approved by the Education Office in Taizz governorate. Truth be told, the school is nothing more than a name. There has never been a school building for these children. In fact, some of the community members voluntarily opened their houses for these children to pursuit their dreams through education. Every day, children keep commuting to this unfinished building to seek knowledge despite all challenges and obstacles.

“I’ve been a volunteer teacher for the past seven years. Ali Ahmed Al-Zailai School is a structure building (non-governmental temporary building), which lacks the simplest educational materials and consists of six classrooms with a total number of 175 pupils (86 boys & 89 girls). There are 16 teachers in the school, including 12 volunteer teachers without any monthly incentives. All in all, this is an appeal for all humanitarian actors to help us build a small school with its education materials for our children to follow their dreams,” Etihad, a school teacher, stated.

Coordination:

In Oct, 2022, RDP planned to respond to the soring needs of education services after coordinating with the Education Sub-Cluster in Taizz governorate as well as the Education Office in the district to get the list of approved volunteer teachers and the list of students already enrolled in the school by the close collaboration of the school principal.

Based on the recommendations and coordination with related local authorities and the Education Cluster, RDP decided to intervene in Ali Ahmed Az Zailai School through conducting a small education activity to help children persist their studies in spite of financial problems. Furthermore, our team paid a visit to see the current condition of the mentioned school to be able to determine the gaps and needs so that humanitarian agencies, including RDP can make a difference and change for these children whom they continue to endure all difficulties for the purpose of seeking knowledge.

Current School Condition:

Ali Ahmed Az Zailai School was established due to the large number of IDPs in Habeel Salman area and the lack of schools nearby to accommodate students. It is a governmental school in a temporary building (just columns and roof). This school contains six classrooms for children from the first grade to the sixth grade. The school lacks basic educational materials as there are no boards, chairs or desks for students. Children sit on the floor without even rugs as well as the absence of an appropriate learning environment for students as the building is one open space without any separating walls, which distracts the students’ focus as the students’ voices overlap from one class to another.

The school also lacks a sufficient number of teachers, as there are only four official teachers, while 12 teachers work voluntarily without any incentives. Mainly, this school needs, above all, an organized and tidy building in which the children get an appropriate educational environment just like the rest of their peers.

Activity Implementation:

Recognizing the needs and gaps of Ali Az Zailai School, RDP has taken action by implementing an education activity to ensure the following goals are achieved;

• Contribute to enhancing children’s access to education, improving the educational environment and alleviating economic pressures on their parents.
• Providing basic teaching materials for the school.
• Support volunteer teachers at the school through monthly incentive
• Encourage children to continue studying.

Activity Components:

– Distribution of school bags: 175 of school bags were distributed to the children of Az Zaila’i school students in order to contribute to supporting students and improving the educational environment.

– Providing the volunteers’ teachers with monthly incentives: The female volunteer teachers in Az Zailai school were supported with monthly incentives, which covered two months of work. These incentives represented support for the continuation of the educational process in the school and to alleviate part of the economic burden on volunteer teachers.

– Providing of whiteboards and teaching materials: RDP provided Ali Ahmed Az Zailai school with 6 whiteboards for the six classrooms and in addition to markers and boards’ erasers to support the education process in the school.

– Providing plastic sheets for the walls: RDP provided Ali Ahmed Az Zailai school with the plastic sheets where the Plastic sheets were installed on the external wall to isolate the internal space of the school from wind and cold weather. This action improved the environment of the school and alleviated the cold on the children.

– Providing rugs for the school floor: RDP provided the school with floor rugs where the students were sitting at the cold solid floor without any thing to sit on. The floor mat was installed for all the 6 classrooms in the school.

– Providing steel cover for the ground water tank: During the visit to the school to assess the need, a ground tank opening was observed inside the school building. This hole was very dangerous for children, so RDP installed a steel cover around the hole to protect the students at the school from the risk of falling into the ground tank.

Activity Impact:

The response RDP has done enabled a quick recovery of educational services in the targeted district by distributing school backpacks, equipment, as well as paying volunteers’ incentives. The quick response was one of the most effective activities that aimed to return students to the school after the challenges they faced, fulfilling a dream of 175 displaced and most vulnerable students.