Education

The teaching department within the structure of Ñanta carries out different functions within the scope of attendance, monitoring and strengthening of school activities and so satisfying the necessities of the children’s learning.

Schooling

Most of the NATs in the centre have reading and writing difficulties regardless of their age, because:

• Their family generally speaks Quechua (80 per cent of the families in the centre are migrants)
• Their rhythm of life doesn’t permit them to study (they spend a lot of time working)
• The level of teaching is dreadful, especially in the evening colleges, or education is is simply out of reach for our beneficiaries.

They are behind in their studies for the same reasons. The consequences are that the adolescent who gets into a course where he can learn to read and write (5-6 years behind) is ashamed. Also it’s difficult to find a college that will accept them, and generally the schooling is at an evening college where the standard is a lot lower.

Lastly work is necessarily a cause of truant cases; our beneficiaries prefer to leave their studies in order to work.

The work of the teaching department

Firstly it’s necessary to motivate the children in any way we can:

• To improve their school achievements
• To make studying a habit
• To arouse interest in learning

As the centre is limited economically, it allows an exchange between school materials and Craftwork.

The teaching department monitors the children’s schooling, reinforces and improves the level as well as regularly monitoring their homework.

There is also a library where each child can find the necessary books for their studies. Every day we buy a newspaper, allowing them to read regularly. They can also play some educational games.

At the moment we work with a population of 90-100 children within the teaching area. Since the beginning of this project in 2005 there have been significant changes.