Trip to Nicaragua Combines Service and Exploration

Each day, they rode on an old American schoolbus for a one hour bus ride on a dirt rode to the San Martin Elementary School, a school housed in a 4-classroom building in dire need of repair.  They tore down the existing kitchen in the 4-classroom school building and began working to rebuild it.  They built up the floor of one of the classrooms with dirt and rock, which they gathered from the nearby river.  All work was done by hand, including the mixing of the cement, and almost all supplies were acquired locally.  In addition to working on the building, our students helped out in the classroom teaching English and teaching math and reading in Spanish.  They also made beaded jewelry and masks and played baseball, soccer, and Frisbee with the students during recess.  In the process, they challenged their comfort zones, experienced a different culture, and helped improve the lives of students in one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere.

The trip was coordinated through Seeds of Learning, a nonprofit organization committed to improving education in rural Latin America. Todd Evans, a 1950 Hawken graduate, began the nonprofit after visiting Latin America on a Habitat for Humanity building trip in 1988. Since the organization’s founding in 1990, nearly 1000 groups have traveled to Latin America to participate in the work group program.

While in Nicaragua, the Hawken group stayed in a hostel in the town of San Ramon.  In addition to the labor-intensive task of re-building the school, Hawken students bonded with the community by helping out in the classroom, teaching English, math, and reading (the latter two in Spanish).  They also made beaded jewelry and masks and played baseball, soccer, and Frisbee with the students during recess.  On the weekend, the group stayed at an eco-tourism lodge on an organic coffee farm, where they hiked, rested, and listened to campesino musicians.  On their last day, they visited a coffee cooperative, a colonial town, and toured Managua.  
 
For more information about Seeds of Learning, visit their website www.seedsoflearning.org.