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Remember that little 3 classroom Christian school many of you
helped me build? Well, in Burkina after the 6th grade, all
students must pass a very important State exam in order to go any further in
school. In addition, if they pass, they receive a diploma which makes
them eligible for certain jobs. It is very difficult to pass. The
students just took this exam last week and it had some very challenging questions
to the point that it was televised how difficult the exam was this year.
Okay, get to the point – they just announced this afternoon
that we scored 95%, the top of the District! That is phenomenal! The
next school had 89% and the last place school had 36% - I’m not trying to gloat
over our score; but give you a comparison of how well they did. Not only
that, but if a student scores a certain number of points, he is “admitted” to 7th
grade on scholarship – ALL of our students who passed were admitted for
scholarship! I don’t know yet what percentage usually get admitted, but I
can tell you I have known very few children who were over the years; so it must
also be hard to achieve.
So, this is a really big deal here because:
1.
Everyone said, “How will the children learn if
you won’t beat them”?
2.
The Department of Education asked “Are you sure
you will be able to cover all the material if you take time out for Bible
lessons?”
3.
They said, you have to make your students come
in on their day off to prepare for the exam. I said, “No, the teachers
and students need a day of rest”. They said, that won’t work.
4.
Most class sizes average 100 students per
teacher. Look what we can do if we limit the class size to 25 (although
the school who scored 36% also had small class sizes).
5.
We took in many children who everyone else had
given up on or were ‘too old’. Karim’s Mom said, “his head is
empty”. Karim passed! Gregoire’s Dad asked me to have his hearing
tested because he was previously doing so poorly in school. We had him
tested and his hearing was fine. Gregoire passed! Gilbert failed
miserably prior to coming to us – we had him in a remedial group – Gilbert
passed! I could go on and on…
6.
The teacher, Innocent, has an 11th
grade education, 2 years of teaching experience, no formal training; but he
knows the Lord!
God absolutely gets the credit here – it doesn’t make sense
otherwise. Sure, I know early childhood education, but what do I know
about Burkina education, a whole different beast. And, teachers with
minimal education and no training; but we focused on putting God first so he
could lead us and look at the results! In fact, I’m quite certain based
on the 6 points I made above that the whole town wondered how the crazy white
lady was going to pull this off; so even they will have to give the Lord credit
because they think I’m crazy!
One more thing – each year there is a big soccer
competition. They play throughout the year and end with the big game.
Our little tiny school with 25 eligible players took 3rd place
amongst the other schools each with about 100 eligible players! No one
saw that coming!
If I were home right now I’d be inviting all of you over to
celebrate! The whole town of Yako is offering their congratulations and
asking “when’s the party?” and “what will you kill? (i.e. cow, goats, etc. just
to clarify!).
One sad note, just one student, a girl named Nafissatou did
not pass. I’ll find out Monday how close she was. Of course she is
in tears and I’m sure humiliated –PLEASE pray for her.
Thank You for all of your support that made this
possible!!
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