UNICEF Guinea Bissau: Usher's story

Usher’s story CHILD FRIENDLY INCLUSIVE EDUCATION

Schools for Africa

Guinea Bissau

CHILD FRIENDLY, INCLUSIVE EDUCATION

Thanks to your support, Usher and other children with disabilities are going to school.

Ponta Nova

Guinea Bissau

2 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

Guinea Bissau became independent in 1973 after fighting a decade-long war of independence against Portugal. Since then, this fragile state has experienced near-constant political instability. This has resulted in increasing poverty for the majority of its population—almost 70 per cent of the population live on less than US $2 per day and 33 per cent survive on less than $1 per day. It has also resulted in severe financial constraints for the Government.

Education, along with other basic social services, suffers from chronic underinvestment. Classrooms are in disrepair, the curriculum is decades out of date, teaching and learning materials are in short supply, and the majority of teachers are untrained and, increasingly, unpaid. In recent years schools have been closed more and more frequently as teachers have gone on strike because their salaries have not been paid, often for months on end.

Further cuts to education and other social services took place in 2012 when, in the wake of another coup, all of the country’s major donors reduced or cancelled their planned budgetary support. “Currently the education situation in this country is not even up to the minimum standards,” says Alfredo Gomes, Guinea Bissau’s Minister for Education, “and for the development of a country education is crucial.”

There is hope however, for despite these challenges, more children are entering the education system than ever before: since 1997, school enrolment (for primary and secondary education) has increased more than 2.5 times from 135,000 students in 1997/98 to 357,000 in 2010/11. But these increases are not equitable. One third of all school age children in Guinea Bissau are out of school—primarily the rural poor, girls and other vulnerable children—for whom access is impeded by the high costs associated with school, the distance they must travel to attend and discrimination.

Child friendly schools are relatively new to Guinea Bissau. Started in 2011, the initiative will expand to reach a total of 145 schools by 2015 (ten per cent of all primary schools in Guinea Bissau), with a focus on promoting equity for the country’s most vulnerable regions. After building an evidence-based case for the initiative, UNICEF will support the MEN in rolling it out across the country.

Given the extremely limited financial resources available to the Government, external financial resources are essential to ensuring that children’s right to education is met. UNICEF is working with the Ministry of Education (MEN) and its partners to ensure donor’s resources are well-managed.

For those who do attend school, educational outcomes are strikingly poor, as the rapid increase in the number of students coupled with limited public investment has made it difficult to provide quality schooling.

In the following pages, you will meet Usher, a first grade student at Ponta Nova Unified School, in the village of Ponta Nova, Oio Region, Guinea Bissau. Born with a physical disability, Usher would almost certainly have joined the 90 per cent of disabled children in developing countries worldwide who are out of school, were it not for his proximity to a UNICEF-supported child friendly school (CFS).

Child friendly schools take a holistic approach to education: they are inclusive and gender-sensitive, they have adequate resources and competent teachers who use child-centred teaching methods, they provide safe water and suitable sanitation facilities, and they are designed to make children feel safe and secure.

Because of the UNICEF-supported training his teacher received, Usher has been welcomed into the school, where he learns as an equal alongside his peers.

This year Usher and his fellow classmates have also benefitted from the fact that, unlike in most schools in Guinea Bissau, the teachers at Ponta Nova have remained in their classrooms and learning has continued uninterrupted. This is thanks to partnerships that have been forged between the school and the local community since the school became child friendly in 2011.

Having the opportunity to attend a child friendly school like Ponta Nova is arguably even more important for Usher than for his able-bodied peers, as his teacher, Antonio Mendoça, explains: “Without education, it is difficult for able bodied people to earn a living, but it is even more difficult for someone like Usher. His grandmother will not be here to take care of him forever. When he is educated, in the future, he will be able to take care of himself.”

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 3

4 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

My name is Usher Renu Olivera Sanca. I am seven years old and I am in the first grade at Ponta Nova Primary School in Ponta Nova village in Guinea Bissau. I live with my cousins and my Grandma Nene. I came to live with her two years ago. At that time I couldn’t walk, I could only crawl. My grandma helped me to walk. Now I go to school like everybody else. I like learning to read and write. When I grow up I want to work in the fields—or maybe I will be a driver.

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 5

06:27 My

cousin Geralda is 15. She takes care of me. She helps me wash my face and brush my teeth. She feeds me and washes my clothes.

6 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 7

NENE CUADE Usher’s ‘Grandmother’

With your UNICEF support...

Schools closer to home Statistical analysis shows that the probability of school attendance decreases as the distance to school increases. A child living within 15 minutes of a school is 44 percentage points more likely to go to school than a child living 45-60 minutes away. Having a school close to home is even more critical for children like Usher, for whom distance to school is likely to mean the difference between being able to attend and being out of school.

Between 2010 and 2014, UNICEF, in partnership with the Ministry of Education (MEN), rebuilt or rehabilitated almost 340 classrooms in hard to reach communities in Guinea Bissau’s most vulnerable zones.

8 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

Usher is the son of my daughter and my nephew. When he was one year old he couldn’t walk, at two he couldn’t walk, at three he couldn’t walk, at four he couldn’t walk. When he turned five he still couldn’t walk. That year I went to their village for a ceremony. I went to see Usher and saw that his body was bent. You needed to hold him to feed him. I asked them to give him to me and I took him home with me. I am a healer so I looked for medicines to treat him. I would help him stand up, then I would help him sit down to rest a bit. He would fall whenever he started walking. This is how we started.

A year went by and in the second year someone came and he said that Usher could go to school. Now he is in school. I am happy because I was never counting on it—that Usher would walk or that he would go to school. And now we have a school in our village. This is good for me because if the school were far away he wouldn’t be able to get there, and I would be the one suffering because of this child.

I took Usher in and God has helped us. Now I just want him to continue to walk, and to go to school until he grows up. Then, he will be clever, and if God calls me Usher will be able to stay here and look after himself.

06:43 Grandma

Nene and Geralda help me get dressed.

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10 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

USHER SANCA First grade student, Ponta Nova Primary School

When I first came here I couldn’t walk. I crawled. I wanted to walk like my friends and go to school. My grandmother boiled some leaves and put that water in a hole and left it to get cool. Then she told me to stand inside the hole and she filled up the hole with dirt and I stayed standing in it for a long time. It hurt. But now I don’t feel any pain.

I can walk and I go to school.

With your UNICEF support...

Building a picture of the situation for children living with disabilities UNICEF puts a great deal of resources and energy into collecting data to inform decisionmakers. Every three years the organisation provides national and regional level data on a series of indicators related to women and children in Guinea Bissau. It also supports the MEN in collecting and compiling data that can be used to improve its planning capacity, including the national education statistics (2009-2011) and the nationwide school census (2013). In July 2013, UNICEF supported Guinea-Bissau in signing the international convention on people with disabilities, and in 2014, UNICEF, in partnership with UNDP, will conduct the

07:48 After

breakfast I walk to school with my cousins.

country’s first national survey on the situation of people with disabilities. The results will orient future policy-making and planning to improve their lives.

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07:48 I’m

the cleverest because I can write.

12 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

08:04 The

teacher takes attendance.

08:22 We

sing a song.

With your UNICEF support...

Addressing the economics of access According to a UNICEF survey on reasons for not attending school, over half of children did not attend because they were unable to pay the costs related to schooling or did not have enough money to buy school materials. These costs hit poor families hardest, and are likely to hit families with a disabled child even harder: households that have members with disabilities generally have lower incomes than other households and are at greater risk of living below the poverty line. UNICEF is planning to increase the access of vulnerable children to school through social protection schemes, such as cash transfers, which will target the most vulnerable children and their families, through school canteens (operated with the World Food Programme and the International Partnership for Human Development), and through the provision of uniforms and extra learning materials.

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 13

With your UNICEF support...

ANTONIO MENDOÇA Head Teacher, Ponta Nova Unified School

Teachers and quality education Teachers are a matter of serious concern in Guinea Bissau. First, the country does not have enough of them: the national primary student–teacher ratio was 52:1 in 2009/10—a figure that is higher in most rural schools. Second, the majority of its teachers have limited schooling and they are not trained to teach.

UNICEF has made teacher training a priority. Through programs that offer continuous training for qualified teachers who need to improve their skills or preand in-service training for untrained teachers who do not yet have the basic skills required to teach, the organisation is working to promote the professional development of the 435 teachers in its child friendly schools by 2015. This includes training in interactive and childcentred teaching and learning practices as well as special education for teaching handicapped students. These trainings will promote quality learning outcomes for all students.

14 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

When I attended UNICEF’s child friendly schools training I learned a little bit about including children who have disabilities in the classroom, but it was not enough.

Here, in Guinea Bissau,couldn’t people like Usher have always been placed apart. They have been considered people who cannot contribute to society. Only now are people starting to see that handicapped people can do the same things as everybody else and that they have the same rights.

This is Usher’s second year in school. There is no problem with his mind—he talks a lot so you can see his mind is just fine—the problem is physical. When he started school he had problems with his movements, especially moving his hands. If I told him something he would just throw his pencil or rip his exercise book, but this year he is much better. He is not doing that anymore.

But having Usher in the classroom still requires patience and effort— especially with 48 other children in the class. I keep him in the front, near me, so I can watch him. When we do an activity I give Usher directions and then I move around the classroom to help the others and finally come back to help him.

I know Usher is capable of succeeding, especially if I keep working with him.

09:14 “Whatever

the other children are learning, Usher can also learn,” says Antonio.

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 15

With your UNICEF support...

The process of supporting inclusiveness Becoming a child friendly school is a process. It does not happen overnight. Ponta Nova Unified Primary School, like all child friendly schools, still struggles to be fully inclusive, particularly in the case of children with disabilities, orphans, and vulnerable children. The school building and grounds do not easily accommodate Usher’s physical disabilities, and the school head and teachers are not yet sufficiently trained to support children with a variety of special needs. UNICEF Guinea Bissau will continue working with child friendly schools and all education stakeholders to strengthen their

09:41 I

like learning to read and write and count.

16 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

ability to be inclusive of and provide support to all children.

09:59

My best friend in school is Mampatchi. She sits with me. Sometimes she helps me write.

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10:08 18 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

PAULO SAMBU School Inspector, Mansoa Sector, Oio Region

With your UNICEF support...

Supervision and oversight

Guinea Bissau faces many challenges when it comes to education.

Previously there were other organisations that provided support to education. Now there is only one—UNICEF—and we rely on them because the state isn’t able to do much. Our teachers don’t have manuals, the students don’t have textbooks, there is no chalk in the classrooms.

The school management lacks training. The school facilities are poor.

The curriculum is out of date, most of the so-called teachers have only finished the seventh or eighth grade and on top of that there is not even the money to pay them, so they are forced to go on strike.

Since 2011 UNICEF has opened ten child-friendly schools in this region, of which two are in my sector. These schools are different. They are model schools. They have latrines. They have water. They have school furniture, teachers’ manuals, textbooks and teaching and learning materials. But the biggest difference is the teachers. As a result of the training they receive, the teachers in these schools have the skills they need to teach, and they have learned that all children—including those with disabilities—must be enrolled in school and treated with care to improve their learning.

Child friendly schools are very important to a country like Guinea Bissau. The more we have, the better it will be for everyone—teachers, students, parents, the community and even the government—everyone will benefit.

School inspectors are responsible for supervising teachers and developing teacher support systems for on-the-job training in the dozens of schools they oversee. By working to improve inspectors’ understanding of childcentred pedagogy along with their capacity to support teachers in implementing it, UNICEF aims to enhance learning outcomes in all of the classrooms in the 145 target schools and beyond.

To ensure that teachers are observed according to a fixed set of criteria that are in keeping with childcentred teaching methods, UNICEF and the MEN have trained the inspectors in child-friendly education according to a newly developed manual. They have also provided most of the inspectors in the country with motorcycles so that they can make regular visits to the schools and give teachers guidance in making child-friendly improvements to their classroom skills.

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10:12 It’s 20 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

hot. At break time we get water and wash our feet.

10:22 Some

people play outside at break. Some look at books. I go inside to do more writing.

With your UNICEF support...

Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) facilities for child friendly schools Access to safe water and adequate sanitation is still poor countrywide both at the community level and in schools. In 2010 in Oio Region, for example, only 16 per cent of schools had functional water points equipped with hand pumps. As part of the child friendly schools initiative, by 2015 all of UNICEF’s 145 target schools will have:: • Access to a safe and sustainable water source; • Child-friendly, separate sanitation facilities for girls and boys; • Hygiene education programmes led by child-to-child sanitation committees; • Links between school management committees and communities to ensure that hygiene education skills acquired in school influence community level behaviour change.

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10:55 I

get to lead the class in counting.

The curriculum is a big problem It is more than 20 years old. The textbooks feature only one person named ‘Bene’—as if there is only one person in the whole community! Children start by learning about Ghana and other countries before they learn about their own; if you ask a student—even one in grade five or six—to name the rivers in Guinea Bissau, he or she won’t be able to do it.

—Paulo Sambu, School Inspector, Mansoa Sector, Oio Region

With your UNICEF support...

Revising the curriculum to make it relevant and child friendly The curriculum currently in use was developed in 1992. UNICEF and the MEN and other education partners are in the process of developing a new curriculum that will be rolled out nationwide at the end of 2014. The new curriculum will reflect the latest approaches to teaching, including child-centred teaching methods. It will also include age appropriate life skills information on topics such as sanitation, nutrition, hygiene, sexual and reproductive health, HIV prevention, peace, environmental conservation and civic education. The aim is to provide a textbook to every student in every subject so that students are not forced to spend most of their class time copying from the blackboard whatever text the teachers have extracted from the textbook. This will benefit not just the 29,000 students in the 145 target schools, but the 280,000 students enrolled in all primary schools nationwide.

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ALBERTO MENDOZA Head of the Village Committee and member of the School Management Committee

With your UNICEF support...

Participatory school management

The School Management Committee was formed three years ago, when this became a child friendly school. Until recently our role was to work with the teachers, parents and community to manage the support the school receives and to maintain the school buildings and furniture. But then last year there was a teacher strike that went on for over sixty days, so our children lost most of their learning time. We wanted our children to go to school, so we decided to work with the community to find a solution.

We held many meetings to discuss the issues. At first the parents didn’t understand why we were asking them to make a contribution. We explained that the money would pay the teachers a small salary, and there would be a little left over to take care of the needs of the school.

When the parents said they didn’t want to pay, we gave them the facts.

We reminded them about how just a few years ago many of our young people had to go away to school. We told them that if there were no longer enough teachers here, our children would again have to go elsewhere to finish primary school and that would be much more expensive than simply paying the teachers we already have. And it would cause us to worry again. We reminded them of how bad we felt when our children were away from us, and how, if they are here in the village with us, we feel at peace—and our children are also available to help at home.

In the end everyone agreed to pay a contribution of 600 CFA/month (US $1.15) for each of their children who are enrolled in the school.

Because we took action, today our school is always open and our children are learning.

Effective partnerships with all of the education stakeholders in the local community help to improve the quality of schools. In all of UNICEF’s child friendly schools, School Management Committees (SMCs) work to support the school, ensuring that responsibility for the school’s success lies with the community and is not concentrated in any one person.

UNICEF is working to build the capacity of 725 SMC members (five per target school) to enhance communityschool relationships, promote stronger school management, and identify, reach out to and enroll vulnerable children— notably girls and children with special needs—through community mobilisation and targeted cash transfers (see box page 15). School-community partnerships are also key to solving many of the other challenges schools face, including keeping schools open in the face of recurrent teacher strikes. These partnerships point to a sustainable way forward as Guinea Bissau strives to accelerate its progress towards education for all.

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We know it is hard for many people to pay the fee, especially if they have many children, so we are flexible. We will even accept payment in chickens.

—Alberto Mendoza, School Management Committee

12:03 I

walk home from school.

When the community decided to pay for the school I was not angry.

I know that if the teachers go on strike and I go to work in the fields, Usher will just be here playing all the time and he will not take time to study. So how could he be clever? That is why I am paying the school, even if he is not a strong student. If Usher becomes clever, it will be good for him. I am an old woman, what will I be able to give him? One day he will have to feed himself and to feed me too. My husband died, my brothers and uncles have all died. The only one left is my grandson.

—Nene Cuade, Usher’s Grandmother 26 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

12:04

12:07

12:14 Look

what we got at school today!

With your UNICEF support...

Providing sufficient teaching and learning materials Given that 94% of public expenditure in the education sector is spent on salaries, there is not enough public funding for materials to support teaching and learning. UNICEF provides the children in its child friendly schools with a learner’s kit, containing a bag, a mini atlas, basic mathematical tables and a stationary set with pencils, pen, eraser, sharpener and notebooks. Teachers receive a kit with two teachers’ guides: one on practical methods of teaching and learning and another on special education needs in the classroom.

Schools also receive maps of Guinea-Bissau and the world, rulers and compass for blackboard-use, register books and chalk.

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12:36 I

eat and change my clothes.

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 31

13:03 I

look after the peanuts. Grandma puts them out to dry and I keep the pigs and chickens away. When they are dry we put them into sacks.

32 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

14:22 When 34 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

I am not in school I like to write and play my drum. My drum has two sticks.

15:13

15:32

15:42 It

is hot. My cousin Sadjo helps me get

some water so I can wash myself and be cool.

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 37

I remember when Usher first came to live here. He was always crawling.

We couldn’t play. Now we like to play football and hide and seek and kick the can.

—‘Mampatchi’, Usher’s friend

Nobody kicks the ball to Usher. He has to run and play like everyone else. He is no different from the rest of us.

—Sadjo, Usher’s cousin

17:18 I

like to play football with my friends.

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 39

In terms of relationships, Usher does very well. He plays well with the other kids and they always take care of him. They do it spontaneously.

But if there is a problem, Usher’s cousin, Sadjo, always protects him. He will stand between Usher and the others.

—Antonio Mendoça, Head Teacher, Ponta Nova Unified School

I like to play with Sadjo. We also like to read together and pinch each other and do our homework together.

—Usher

17:46 When

I get tired, I watch the others play. I like it when Sadjo sits with me.

40 UNICEF Guinea Bissau

18:10 My cousin Aliya washes me. “We don’t wash Usher because he is different,” she says.

“We wash him because that is what we do with all of the children, and he is one of the children.”

Schools for Africa Usher’s story 43

All children have the right to an education.

UNICEF is working with the Government, local education authorities and NGOs to provide Guinea Bissau’s most vulnerable children with access to a quality education that will allow them to take their rightful place as equal participants in society.

www.schoolsforafrica.org

ABOUT UNICEF Thank you for believing that all children have the right to an education.

Together with you, UNICEF is working to make a difference for all children, everywhere, all the time. All children have rights that guarantee them what they need to survive, grow, participate and fulfill their potential. Yet every day these rights are denied. Millions of children die from preventable diseases. Millions more don’t go to school, or don’t have food, shelter and clean water. Children suffer from violence, abuse and discrimination. This is wrong.

UNICEF works globally to transform children’s lives by protecting and promoting their rights. Their fight for child survival and development takes place every day in remote villages and in bustling cities, in peaceful areas and in regions destroyed by war, in places reachable by train or car and in terrain passable only by camel or donkey.

Their achievements are won school by school, child by child, vaccine by vaccine, mosquito net by mosquito net. It is a struggle in which success is measured by what doesn't happen—by what is prevented.

UNICEF will continue this fight—to make a difference for all children, everywhere, all the time.

To fund all of its work UNICEF relies entirely on voluntary donations from individuals, governments, institutions and corporations. We receive no money from the UN budget.

UNICEF Guinea Bissau

Apartado 464 1034 Bissau Codex Bissau REPUBLIC OF GUINEA BISSAU Tel :

+ (245) 320-3581/84

Fax:

+ (245) 320-3586

E-mail: bissua@unicef.org www.unicef.org/infobycountry/guineabissau.html Facebook: Unicef Guiné-Bissau

The Schools for Africa initiative is a successful international fundraising partnership between UNICEF, the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the Peter Krämer Stiftung. For more information please visit www.schoolsforafrica.org.

Photography, words and design: Kelley Lynch