Building a School for a Lost Generation

Local Group Spearheads Effort in Sudan
 

Although it’s been three years since peace came to southern Sudan, the devastation left by 21 years of civil war is still visible everywhere.
Poverty abounds in this East African country. I have visited a number of developing countries, but nowhere have I seen a place so desperately poor. There is no electricity. No running water. No telephone or mail service. Gigantic potholes dot the unpaved roads. People live in round mud huts with thatched roofs and dirt floors. Most have little or no furniture. People generally cook on an open fire, eat, sleep and do most of their living outside. Chickens and goats wander about, sometimes into the huts.
Most people in the countryside only eat one meal a day, usually a starch made of millet flour and sorghum, and vegetables from their gardens. Those in the cities may eat twice a day.

A Visit to Southern Sudan
I was part of a nine-member mission team from the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia that spent 10 days in southern Sudan in late March and early April. The team included the Rt. Rev. Peter James Lee, bishop of the Virginia diocese, and the Rev. David Copley, director of mission personnel for the Episcopal Church Center in New York.
Our 19-seat plane landed on a dirt strip in the middle of a field in Rumbek. Everywhere we went, the Sudanese greeted us with songs, dancing, smiles and warm handshakes. The resilience of the people is remarkable.
Because of the civil war, an entire generation received no education. Illiteracy is high and everywhere our team went, people—young and old—expressed a desire to go to school.
A Richmond-based foundation, Hope for Humanity, is helping to make that possible.
New School Gives Hope
Hope for Humanity was founded by a Goochland County couple and Maker Marial, one of the “Lost Boys of Sudan” who has lived in Henrico County for the last seven years. It raised money to build Hope and Resurrection Secondary School in the Rumbek village of Atiaba, former home of Maker.
The 10-room high school, which held its first classes on May 5, is a symbol of hope to the southern Sudanese that they can rise above their poverty. During the mission team’s recent visit, the school was dedicated by Bishop Lee in a four-hour service attended by more than 400 people. Some arrived the day before the dedication and slept outside on the ground.
The area served by this high school has 73 primary schools, which hold classes under trees. Pupils write their lessons in the dirt with sticks. Hope and Resurrection is the second high school in the area and the first to be built since 1947.
Having a permanent structure will allow classes to be held year round, without the interruption which typically occurs during long periods of heavy rain.

From Goochland to Sudan
The idea for the school was born about five years ago by Jennifer Ernst, a Goochland resident who befriended Maker.
When helping the “Lost Boys”—about 100 of whom live in the Richmond area—Jennifer wanted to see where the boys had lived. She visited Kakuma, a refugee camp in Kenya established by the United Nations in 1992. The camp had been Maker’s home for eight years before he came to the United States in 2000.
Many of the “Lost Boys” here and in the refugee camp asked Jennifer to help them go to school.Once back in the U.S., she tried to find sponsors to send the boys to boarding schools in Uganda and Kenya.
Five years ago, Jennifer, her husband, Darryl, and Maker held a walk to raise money for education of the Sudanese. Jennifer decided building a school in Sudan would educate more children for less money than sending them to boarding schools in other African countries.
Building a permanent structure in southern Sudan is expensive because all materials must be brought in from the neighboring counties of Kenya and Uganda. The school cost $260,000. Now Hope for Humanity is continuing to raise money to pay teachers and to buy textbooks and uniforms for the students. The organization also is beginning a second phase: building teachers’ housing, which is one of the benefits teachers in Africa receive. Future plans call for construction of a kitchen and dining hall and boarding facilities for students.
Most of the students entering this year’s ninth grade class are in their 20s and 30s, older than the usual ninth graders because of the many years when education was not available in southern Sudan.
Some live a two- to three-hour walk from the school. Girls who attend a day school must fetch water and gather firewood before leaving for school. In the evenings, they prepare dinner and do other chores, leaving little or no time for homework.
No matter what obstacles are in front of them, the southern Sudanese will go to school. Hope and Resurrection Secondary School will educate the next leaders of southern Sudan.

More information about Hope for Humanity is at hopeforhumanityinc.org. To donate, make checks payable to Hope for Humanity Inc. and mail to P.O. Box 29117, Richmond, VA 23242.

Alberta Lindsey spent 42 years as a newspaper reporter. Now a freelance writer in Richmond, she enjoys reading mysteries, traveling and photography.

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