Who We Are
Since 2010, Haiti-Now has been dedicated to improving the lives of impoverished children in Haiti through education. We partnered with a community school and established a successful Book Bank, distributing thousands of text books to hundreds of disadvantaged children. We provided literacy interventions, teacher training, tuition, housing, healthcare, and food assistance. Working primarily with Restavek children allowed us to more fully understand the trauma they endured, the complex forces shaping their lives, and the insufficient assistance they received. Organizations working on behalf of Restavek children have tended to focus on raising awareness, engaging host families, encouraging education, and a variety of short-term solutions. But it wasn’t enough. An entirely new model was necessary, learn more about the Residential School.
Since 2010
Based on our experience working with over 700 children in servitude, most children’s access to food and shelter is contingent to heavy unpaid work, abuse, and exploitation. By 2016, we found that most programs and interventions do not achieve the ultimate goal of overcoming conditions of extreme poverty. We stopped all programs, researched all organizations working with Restavek children, and began designing a new comprehensive program: the Residential School. In 2018, we reopened the Book Bank, maintained in a slum of Port au Prince. We are currently fundraising to build the Residential School. Learn more about our work during the last 10 years.
Literacy Circle
The purpose of the Literacy Circle was to increase students’ achievement in reading and to provide learning opportunities that promote an intrinsic desire for the love of reading. A program in which Haitian teachers were trained to provide research-proven strategies to enhance reading experiences. Not only did students' reading scores improve, but teachers also gained confidence and demonstrated improved skills after professional development. Over 400 students participated, and six teachers were trained.
Teachers Training
Eight elementary teachers received professional training in pedagogy, cognitive skills, didactic instruction, professional ethics, school-term planning, curriculum use, classroom management, testing and exam materials, and French language. Two teachers received laptops with a 64gb bank of digital French and Creole content.
School Supplies
Over 700 students received pencils, pens, erasers, pencil sharpeners, classroom posters, classroom geometry sets, and Haitian notebooks.
Book Bank
In 2010, Haiti Now established an ongoing Book Bank program to increase the quality of education among Haitian children. The program distributed over 7000 textbooks on all subjects to more than 700 students.
Housing & Food
Eleven students received cash to rent one year of housing. We have often contributed to many individual families, school canteens, and internally displaced people.
Immunization
Over 100 students received all the immunizations required by the Haitian Ministry of Health.
Tuition
Sixty-four students received tuition for seventh, eighth, and ninth grades.
Teachers Bonuses
Eight teachers received 32 cash bonuses.
Human Rights Advocacy
Haiti Now has advocated on behalf of children in servitude with the police, judges, prosecutors, senators, priests and pastors, local non-profit organizations, UNHRC, and community meetings.
Medical Screening
Haiti Now initiated medical screenings for over 60 children with unknown or incomplete health records, including: physical exam, medication history, past medical/surgical history laboratory screening, including TB/chest x-ray testing, HIV, malaria, syphilis, and mental health screenings.
Real Time Data
Salesforce capabilities enable us to develop better understandings of the children we work with and what strategies to deploy to reach them according to their specific situations. We started to collect data in 2010. Originally we were tracking only the textbooks distributions and matching textbooks with students' profiles. Later we added a grade book and we started to record recipients' academic performance. Recently we have developed a mobile app to log attendance, curriculum progression, grading rubrics, notes and observations. All of the charts below update in real-time as new data is entered into the system or the app. Our design focused on collecting data because a learning management system (LMS) is energy intensive and can be heavily dependent on the internet, these are unreliable resources in Haiti, particularly among poor schools.
