Local Rotary members aid Mexico classrooms
First it was used ambulances and fire trucks heading to Mexico, but now Lethbridge people are helping to build classrooms there as well.
Lethbridge members of Rotary International were delivering decommissioned emergency vehicles donated by southern Alberta communities in 2014, when they learned about a makeshift school for kindergarten students that had been built from discarded pallets.
Four Mexican teachers had completed that project after school hours, the visitors learned. Then they started teaching preschoolers, no charge.
“These teachers would volunteer their time and teach the children in the morning, then go to work for paid employment in the afternoon,” says Rotary member and retired U of L geography professor Ian MacLachlan.
Back in Lethbridge, members of the universitybased Rotaract Club learned about the situation and raised more than $36,000 through a series of dinners and silent auctions. Working with the Rotary Club of Lethbridge East, they contacted the Rotary Club of Mazatlan. Club members there secured the support of local and state officials and gained some financial support as well.
And plans for a basic two-room schoolhouse expanded to provide six classrooms as well as office space.
“We had the goal to build this community a proper building where they could have a kindergarten,” says Rotaract member Katie Wilson. “But we didn’t want then to just have a kindergarten, we wanted it to be accredited by the government, so that it was recognized to allow the kinds into Grade 1.”
In that part of Mexico, she notes, attending kindergarten is a prerequisite for children starting Grade 1. But while the state pays for elementary school education, it does not fund kindergartens.
So in poor communities, some neighbours band together to operate kindergarten classes as best they can.
“It’s crazy to think that these kids do not have the opportunity to attend school available to them like we do here, and how much effort their prents and their community are putting in to provide them with that,” Wilson says.
The Lethbridge East club is now providing school supplies, she adds. And now, with a sound building in place, the community is hoping to use it for outreach services as well.
“They want to bring in a dentist and a doctor, and they now have a modern facility to host things like that.”
Looking ahead to its next projects, Rotaract is holding its 12th annual dinner and silent action on Jan. 21 at the Sandman Hotel. Proceeds from this year’s fundraiser will support the graffitti program operated by the local Boys and Girls Club.