‘WHY WOULD WE GIVE UP ON HAITI?’
Country still rebuilding decade after quake ... with a little help from young Canadians
They called it Haiti fatigue. Just months after the 2010 earthquake rocked the country’s capital, killing hundreds of thousands and displacing more than one million people, donors and development workers started talking about the futility of their work.
There was a growing sense of frustration in the international community, fuelled by years of complicated United Nations interventions, that Haiti’s political turmoil had derailed reconstruction, that aid couldn’t make a difference for a country so mired in crisis. A decade later, the world is still having that conversation while many Haitians grow frustrated with consistently negative portrayals of their country, and the failure to recognize the successes they have achieved.
I’ve had the unique opportunity to see this story unfold from different vantage points, learning from the Haitians leading local efforts to rebuild and aid workers on the ground. Haitians aren’t giving up, and their determination is inspiring Canadian kids — who don’t give up that easily either.
I was in the capital, Port-auPrince, in the days after the
7.0 earthquake, 10 years ago this week. I rushed there, worried about the fate of the children and staff in the communities our charity had partnered with for more than a decade. Thankfully, schools remained standing.
I’ve since been back to visit the locals who are continually rebuilding, not just in the capital but in rural communities across the county. Each trip offers a new glimpse of hope in the form local engineers designing earthquake-proof classrooms with school gardens on campus to feed students, or groups of parents pooling their savings to invest in livestock for breeding as a source of sustainable income.
Behind every statistic and news story are individuals creating their own change. I think of these achievements when I’m disheartened at the scale of the need that remains or frustrated at reports of mismanagement in the non-profit sector.
Those successes also inspire teachers and students across Canada, who aren’t giving up either. They continue to organize bake sales, charity dances and car washes. While much of the international community has moved on, Canadian teachers and students are still working tirelessly to support Haitian projects (including our charity’s work, as well as other organizations such as Partners in Health and Doctors Without Borders, both leaders in the sector).
Jan Divok is a teacher at Toronto’s Glen Ames Senior Public School. She’s helped her grades 7 and 8 classes organize fundraising campaigns for Haiti for nearly a decade, collecting enough to build a schoolroom and support water programming in La Chanm, an isolated community in the Central Plateau region. “Why would we give up on Haiti?” she asks. “We want to continue to help in any way we can.”
Therese Boudreau-MacKinnon, a teacher at Ellenvale Junior High School in Dartmouth, N.S., says her school feels a strong connection to Haiti because of the country’s French roots.
Divok and Boudreau-MacKinnon are two of hundreds of Canadian teachers motivated by the incredible momentum Haitians have already achieved, and their continued determination. A decade after the earthquake, Haiti has been hit by hurricanes and tropical storms, floods and draughts. Haitians are still working to rebuild — and young Canadians are with them.
Craig Kielburger is co-founder of the WE Movement, which includes WE Charity, ME to WE Social Enterprise and WE Day.