An Afro-library for quilombola children (Afroteca)

Huge thanks to those of you who supported this microproject, which, having completed its three-month cycle, has now been retired. We launched the campaign alongside another one on the Brazilian Kickante crowdfunding website and are happy to tell you that, with support from other partners, the project is now fully funded and ready to launch!

Alongside our individual supporters, other project partners include Braskem, a private company, through their Projects that Transform Lives grant; the Global Fund for Children (GFC); Indorama, another private company; the local Municipal Department for Education and their Coordinating Department for Racial Equality; as well as another organization, which has asked to remain anonymous.

In order to run a project of this size, we have relocated to the Cordoaria Quilombo, establishing Viva a Vida there as a mechanism to support the community. Working with traditional peoples strengthens our mission and our strategy, whose main aim is to combat racism. These last three months have therefore been dedicated to establishing partnerships, hiring the team, planning project implementation, including fine tuning our methodology and establishing evaluation instruments and indicators, and opening our new offices.

All together this means that, through you support we are getting ready to launch the Afroteca Muvuca on 22 March!

The work will focus on literature and identity with 90 children from the Cordoaria Quilombo in Vila de Abrantes, pupils from four local elementary schools. The Afroteca Muvuca is currently being set up in a fully equipped container in order to receive 20 children per day, three times a week, with monthly storytelling activities open to all the community. The library contains 150 books on black, indigenous and quilombola themes, which will be used in classes, applying an educational plan constructed by educators specializing in Afro-centered Education.

This work forms part of Viva a Vida’s institutional strengthening strategy, which, over the coming years, will be focused on creating strong links with public and private bodies in order to become a center of reference for work with Human Rights in the State of Bahia, specifically with traditional peoples and black youth.

To add more value and new social technologies to our project, on 25 February we held our First Meeting about Education for Ethnic-Race Relations, mediated by educational specialists and Viva a Vida consultants Mariana Barreto and Vanessa Lemos and held in the building of the Cordoaria Residents Association. The meeting was attended by the Viva a Vida team and board members, community leaders, a representative from the Department of Racial Equality, and representatives from other quilombos and funders.

We discussed strategies about how to develop and apply the ethnic-racial approach within formal education arenas, specifically focusing on quilombola children. The mediators discussed the history of education and racism in Brazil and encouraged participants to consider their own identity and self-image, relating this to their personal experiences of racism and other rights violations. Their empowering and sensitive approach led to a rich debate about the real impacts of racism and other violations, and how we will combat these using a Afro-centered approach in the Afroteca Muvuca.

Without your support, none of this enriching work would have been possible, so please accept our thanks and our appreciation of your generous donations!