To bring literacy to all in the community. To provide vocational education where young men and women can learn a trade. To have a permanent medical clinic that gives care to sick-needy people.
In registering kids for the school, we had noticed there were many young girls in Pardieu who could not continue their education because they had children at an early age. Thus they don't have the mean to take care of them. Other women didn't have the possibility to receive an education beyond 6th grade. We opened a Sewing School for these young women; there, they can learn a new trade that will better their lives and their family. They learned the skill of seamstress, embroidery, and pastry. They spent three years in the school and left with a certificate.
The school is a K-6 Elementary. Students take the National Exam after 6th grade. Approximately 99% of the 6th graders tested, passed the national exam that promoted them to Middle School. The fourth, fifth, and sixth graders, besides the regular curriculum (reading, writing, math, sciences, social study, Creole, French and Bible), they receive instructions on gardening as a mandatory extra curriculum. An agronomist gave these instructions once a week. Then, those students came back in the afternoon under the supervision of a coordinator using the School's garden as a training ground to grow vegetables. The goal is for these students to duplicate what they learned and practiced in the School's garden in their backyards so that they along with their parents can eat better and healthier foods.
Young men in Pardieu don't stay in the community, because there is nothing available to them. They cross the border to the Dominican Republic, to work in horrible conditions (sugar cane field). There, the majority of them live in promiscuity, get sick, came back to the community to die leaving behind young children. A Vocational School was opened to these young men, so they can learn a trade and stay with their family.
In the afternoon, a classroom is opened for adults who are interested to learn how to read and write. There were many who participated in this event. Progress was made, many of them learned how to read and write.