St Bernadette’s School for educational growth

Columban Frs Carlo Jung (left) and Peter O’Neill (right) together with Ruth Malpartida in front of St Bernadette’s Remedial School in Lima, Peru. - Photo: Fr Peter O'Neill

Although Joel was 18 when he started in the school, he couldn’t hold a pencil. He would speak to nobody and was always bad-tempered, but over the weeks and months, he started to come out of his shell and be more communicative and friendly with the other children. Little by little, he started learning.

His mother told us his story. “My son Joel was a normal child who ran about and played happily with his friends until the age of three when he came down with meningitis. He went into convulsions, and when I asked some of the neighbours for a lift to the hospital, nobody was interested and told me to forget about it. I eventually received a lift, but by then he was foaming at the mouth. In the hospital, they gave him oxygen, but he stayed rigid until, little by little, he started to respond. When he finally recognised me, he smiled.

“After a month in hospital, he was allowed home, but he had become like a baby again, neither walking nor talking. I was to take him for rehabilitation and buy medicines; but very soon after, my daughter was born, and I couldn’t keep up the payments for the treatment. His father and brothers took no interest in him, and I had to work to keep the family, so Joel was never sent to school and stayed at home selling alfalfa outside the front door.

“One day, Elsa of the Children’s Centre passed by and told me I could send Joel to St Bernadette’s Remedial School, which is just in front of our house. So, Joel started, and very soon, I was amazed at what he was able to do in the workshops.

He has very little movement in his hands, walks with difficulty, and talks very little, but the change that came over him was unbelievable in such a short space of time. He would bring things home that he had made, something I thought would have been impossible for him to do.

“I was always worried about what would happen to Joel when I died, but now I have greater hope for him. I will put a little kiosk outside the house where he can sell the things he makes and that will keep him going. I am very grateful to Elsa for offering Joel a place in the school and to all the teachers who have such patience with him.”

If ever there was an oasis in this barren and dusty area of Lima, it would be St Bernadette’s Remedial School, with its gardens and farm animals roaming freely on the grounds.

It looks more like a recreational park than a school, which is why the children who once hated the thought of going to school love coming to us. It is a different experience that allows them to enjoy the work and, therefore, overcome their difficulties.

Ruth Malpartida, the Institutional Coordinator of St Bernadette's Children's Centre. - Photo: Fr Peter O'Neill

There is space for around eighty children divided between the workshops and classrooms, with a maximum of ten in a class. The children are grouped according to their difficulties rather than age or level. They also have individual sessions with a psychologist, as the block to their learning is often emotional.

The idea came about through our work with children who live in poverty. We observed the difficulties they confront in their daily lives, not least of all an indifference to the neglect that many of them suffer, which leaves them below the level of normal development for their age.

For example, the children who use the library in the centre have homework they just don’t understand, and so have fallen way behind in class. These children often are asleep during class as many must work at night selling sweets on the buses and have no energy for school, while others suffer from inadequate nutrition. Family violence and breakup can also traumatise the children and cause a huge emotional block to their learning.

Because of this problem, many children repeat a year. When this becomes a pattern, they are not allowed to enrol the following year, thus losing the opportunity to gain an education. We decided to try to help these children overcome their emotional and learning difficulties by starting up a study program with psychological input at the centre.

This was very successful, although we didn’t have nearly enough space to develop the project further - hence, the frequent request by our staff to find or build other premises, which we were eventually able to do.

We have agreements with twelve local schools, who send us the children they encounter with learning problems. These children stay with us for a year. Those who overcome their difficulties, generally about 80%, will return to their school of origin, and the rest will remain with us to learn trades and other skills in the workshops of shoemaking, ceramics, costume-jewellery etc., while also attempting to finish their primary school studies.

These children are now happy in their efforts to overcome their deficiencies in learning as they steadily grow in confidence and acquire a new-found self-esteem. It is essential to keep the children as the focus of our work as we try to identify their individual needs rather than having them adapt to a set method dictated to them by the institution. But with this openness to learn from the children, I feel we will have something worthwhile to offer society and a model for others to follow. Meanwhile, children and young people like Joel have been rescued from abandonment and are now happy to be learning.

Columban Fr Tony Coney lives and works in Peru.