"Life Lessons" by Elizabeth Stevens from the Exeter Bulletin, Spring 2008
Student volunteers Sofia Hyatt '08 and Ryan Wong '09 (rear) at a Honduran orphanage
Two years ago, I was telling an old friend about my plans for my upcoming sabbatical. Together with my family, I would spend the year living and working at an orphanage in Honduras.
My friend looked at me like I was a bit crazy.“Why would you ever want to do that?” she asked.
Why not? I thought. It’s so easy. How many jobs in the world allow you to pick up and leave for a sabbatical, and then return with a place to live and your job right where you left it? In fact, how could I not do this?
And so, in July 2006 began the latest Stevens family adventure. My husband, Carl, and I pulled our two boys Henry, 10, and Lucas, 7, out of school and headed south to Central America, to an orphanage run by the organization Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos (NPH) – Our Little Brothers and Sisters. NPH was founded by the late Father Wasson, an American priest. Its mission is to provide shelter, healthcare, education, food and clothing to orphaned and abandoned children in an environment that fosters unconditional love and acceptance, sharing, work and responsibility. NPH runs nine orphanages throughout Central and South America and the Caribbean.
The orphanage where we would spend the next year is located on a 2,000-acre property in central Honduras. NPH hired Carl, who's an engineer by training, to work in maintenance and construction, while I would teach at the orphanage school, first in their science lab, and then some English classes. Our boys would attend the school with the children.
A Tale of Two Schools
It turned out that NPH is a lot like PEA, and a lot not like PEA. For example, just like PEA, NPH is a big community of adults and youngsters working together. At NPH, the children live in dormitory-like buildings called
hogares. The community of adults all know each other and interact regularly. There are staff meetings, a kitchen/dining hall, classes and activities.
On the other hand, at NPH the kids never go home on vacation; only the dorm parents do. At PEA each meal includes a variety of choices and an unlimited amount of quality food. At NPH a typical meal is rice and beans, and sometimes beans and rice, or maybe a potato. At PEA every boarding student has his or her own dorm room (or a room shared with just one other roommate); and a computer, a phone, a common room with a TV, and access to the best academic and athletic facilities money can buy. At NPH each child has one locker in which to store all of his or her belongings, a bunk room shared with 20 other roommates, and the choice of a pillow or blanket, but not both. The children eat their meals, do their homework and relax at the hard, wooden picnic tables located in each hogar.
At PEA students’ days are filled with classes and activities, and in their spare time they do their homework. Our students work hard academically, and there is little time for much else. At NPH the children also work very hard and have full days—only their days are filled with schoolwork and hard physical labor. At NPH three maintenance workers oversee the 25 buildings and surrounding grounds (compared to the 125 or so employees at PEA), and so after school the children work on the ranch for two hours, contributing to the upkeep of the community and raising of the food. Their ranch work is followed by dorm chores and hand-washing their laundry.
The final difference is also the most profound: At PEA the majority of the students have families. At NPH most of the children have lost both parents, and any other relatives are too poor to take them in. Many were abandoned and abused. A number are HIV positive or have developed AIDS.
So often during our year in Honduras, I found myself wishing that my students at PEA could witness the lives of these children. I wanted our PEA students to see their resilience, their hope and their happiness. I wanted our students to experience what my family and I were discovering: that giving to others is the most meaningful endeavor there is.
And so began my plan to share this experience with Exeter students. We chose 12 students to make the trip with us, to spend a week working with the children and completing projects on the ranch.
Read the experiences of these 12 PEA students in The Exeter Bulletin, Spring '08...
