St. Etienne
ABOUT ST. ETIENNE
Located less than ten miles away from the Haitian border to the Dominican Republic, St. Etienne sits atop a scenic hill in the Haitian countryside. The school is fairly remote, and there are no paved roads in sight.
As you can see in the picture above, there are a few houses that are near St. Etienne, but the majority of children walk many miles to get to and from school every day. These students are very passionate about their education!
Although a month's tuition is $7, many families can barely afford to pay $5 a month for their childrens' education.
As you can see by the number of pictures of students in each grade, the size of each successive class decreases. Students are sometimes left with no choice but to drop out of school either because they cannot afford it or because they need to get a job to support their families. However, a few dedicated older students return to St. Etienne to complete higher grade levels when they can.
WHAT I'VE DONE
St. Stephen's Episcopal School in Austin, TX and St. Etienne in Salmadere, Haiti are sister schools. Several St. Stephen's students visit and volunteer at St. Etienne during spring break and over the summer with the help of numerous dedicated faculty members. The Haiti trips allow St. Stephen's students to get a glimpse of what life in Salmadere can be like.
In past years, students and teachers from St. Stephen's have built school benches, painted classrooms, and created school kits.
A pre-school building and a library have recently been built!
Hi! My name is Sarika and I am a graduate of St. Stephen's Class of 2017.
I first went to Haiti during the spring break of my freshman year of high school in 2014. This was my first trip to a truly poor, third world country, making my experience there very eye-opening. Being able to witness poverty up close was much different that just hearing about it. As you would expect, I couldn't help but sympathize with everyone I saw living amidst the poverty in Haiti. Being in Haiti for a week was a little tough, but I was always gauranteed food, water, safety, and the fact that I would be back in the comfort of my home in a week. However, the students at St. Etienne don't always have that assurance.
After returning home, I was driven to find a way to help the students and families of St. Etienne as much as possible. I knew that I couldn't change their situations completely, but I wanted to do whatever I could to help. As a Girl Scout, I decided to focus my Gold Award project around creating a deeper awareness for the St. Etienne community and finding new and exciting ways to connect their lives to ours.
In January 2015, I organized a beanie baby drive at Laurel Mountain Elementary. With LME's help, I was able to collect over 300 beanie babies to give to the St. Etienne students! The joy expressed in the children's faces was ineffable; everything in at St. Etienne goes a long way. Before going on my second trip to Haiti in March 2015, I put together a first aid kit, which I gave to the head of St. Etienne.
Finally, I created this website in order to educate more people about St. Etienne. The main thing that stood out to me during my past three trips to Haiti is that the students at St. Etienne are eager to get an education, and they need all the help that they can get to make their goal possible.
There's still more to come!
