Each year HLD distributes between 25,000 and 40,000 textbooks to approximately 5000 children in 19 public primary schools throughout the island of La Gonave, one of the more remote and underdeveloped places in Haiti. The new academic year gets underway in Haiti on October 1, 2012, for hundreds of thousands of children. In 13 years HLD has made tremendous progress in helping children in La Gonave become more educated, unfortunately there are still too many children who are not attending school
In Haiti today, the lack of basic education increases the tolerance for political corruption, hinders development, and sustains a culture of dependency and honors poverty. The end result is political chaos, economic stagnation and abject poverty. Three-fourths of the population live in the countryside, where there are very few public schools, which are for the most part badly equipped, and isolated academically from the rest of the country.
HLD textbook lending has already impacted 15000 students since it began in 2001, providing textbooks to all children in grades 1-6 in all 19 public schools from throughout the island of La Gonave, Haiti. Without textbooks, students can be turned away by the teacher, rendering it unlikely for the student to return due to embarrassment and lack of money to buy the required textbooks.
Providing textbooks to the students on a lending basis, we're alleviating the financial burden on the parents. Therefore, helping more students who would otherwise be sent off to live with wealthier families or forced at an early age to work the land to help provide for the family, access to education.By giving each and every child an equal opportunity to become literate, we're helping Haiti to develop functional citizens, who'll be able to design more hopeful and prosperous future.
