Our New SCHOOL! That's what is New!!
An Inspiring Visit by an inspiring visitor.On Friday 16th August,we were honored to welcome Dylan Moens. Dylan is Belgian and he is deaf. he was visiting Rwanda along with his girlfriend Maite(she is not Deaf) whose mother is Rwandan. by visiting Rwanda Dylan was also curious about deaf education and what it is like to be deaf in Africa and Rwanda in particular. that is how he came across our website and arranged a visit to our school. one can ask why Dylan was so curious about what it is like to be deaf in Rwanda. Dylan is 25, he has a bachelors degree in accountancy and tax and works in the legal tax department of a multinational company in Belgium. it would not be exaggerating to say that had Dylan been Rwandan it would have been nearly impossible for him to have a degree and a good job while being hearing impaired at such a young age. of course Deaf Education in Rwanda has made tremendous progress but it still faces so many challenges that it is nearly impossible for a deaf in Rwanda to be diagnosed on time and be able to learn successfully through the years and become a University Graduate by the time they turn 25. a tour of our school helped Dylan witness what it is like to be deaf in Rwanda from an 8 year old deaf pupil in primary 1. to being a deaf adult receiving vocational training in sewing,knitting or wood carving. his visit did not only highlight the wide difference between African and European deaf education. but it also showcased what deaf children in Africa can achieve with the right resources. it was so inspiring for many of our deaf adults to meet such a brilliant young man it was yet another proof to all of us that DISABILITY IS NOT INABILITY. Thank you Dylan and Maite for the visit, inspiration and memories. We know you have enjoyed the school visit as much as we did and we hope that you also enjoyed your stay to the country of a Thousand Hills.
Our graduation program has kicked off!It is EmCD 's vision that we should enroll children for a limited period of time. This will not only help us make more room for new coming children, it will also serve our ultimate vision of having deaf children who are socio-economically integrated into the Rwandan community. And of course for that integration to be possible graduating from the deaf school back to their communities is the only way.
On July 19th the first of our graduates went back home into her community, she is a graduate in tailoring. she has gone back to her community to work and become a full socio economic member. We believe that Building on marginalized young people’s capital by providing business investments not only reduces poverty, but can also alter negative community perceptions of disability. Louis is EmCD founder and Executive Director but also has an active role of working as Transition and Integration Manager of the Deaf school. He will be in charge of making Hillary's integration back into her community as smooth as possible by paying regular visits to her to find out any setbacks and try to come up with appropriate measures to address them. Thank you to 18 year old Hillary, tailoring graduate at Nyabihu deaf school. After working super hard for 3 months and producing all our beautiful tailored things, We hope that she will keep up her excellent work with her tailoring business start up kit in Burera District Good luck Hillary! THE SECOND TERM OF THE 2019 SCHOOL YEAR IS UNDERWAY AT NDSD. The last term saw 73 children (62%) of our children score 60% and above on average. which is a performance to be very proud of! we will be looking forward to building on it and perform even better this term.
We have started this term with more than one positives that are going to boost the life of the children and everyone at NDSD in general. the biggest of them being that through Deaf Reach, an English charity whose programme in Rwanda seeks to strengthen Deaf schools(https://deafreach.org) we have been able to get funding for water tanks. these tanks are not only an economic benefit due to decreased water bills in the future. but also a requirement for every school in Rwanda for accreditation. again because of quite heavy rains in Nyabihu. it was very recommended to have water tanks as a measure of dealing with rainwater. In addition to the water tanks, we have received other donations from Deaf Reach that are very useful for our children's health and sanitation. they are mosquito nets for all the children and an incinerator that will be used to burn waste such as papers, Girls sanitary pads,etc
We are looking forward to a more successful second term of the year with smiles!
We are hiring!who would not be excited by the idea of working with us? of course not many! working with us will enable you to change children's lives positively and forever,it will enable you to learn and develop both personally and professionally.
follow these links and learn more about who we want to hire in the next few days! it might be you and we will be very honored to welcoming and working with you. 1. http://www.jobplus.rw/job/administrator/ 2. http://www.jobplus.rw/job/business-development-officer/ A week with visitors means a week with blessings. as we say in kinyarwanda "ABASHYITSI NI UMUGISHA" WHICH MEANS IN ENGLISH "VISITORS ARE A BLESSING".
On Thursday last week a delegation from a Local ADEPR church paid a visit to our new school. they wanted to get to know more about us,our activities, and more importantly to meet the children. so that they could hand out some gifts to them, and socialize with them. this delegation was made of Priests from the church, and a Choir. they had a tour of the school, and a presentation session of who we are and what we do. afterwards we discussed about a possibility of partnering with the church mainly through Compassion International a charity that works with children through ADEPR in Rwanda. among the gifts that they brought for the children were Food, Hygienic materials,(Toilet papers,), and learning materials(Books,pens,...). it is very encouraging that now the local people have started to understand the importance of our presence and the work that we are doing with the children.
The visit ended with a sermon and an entertainment session with the choir singing for the children. THANK YOU VERY MUCH ADEPR JENDA. Our dream has become a reality
The building started in early 2018 and we hoped that it would be finished by the summer, But of course, it wasn,t! But in January 2019, our children and staff were able to start their new academic year in the new buildings.
SOME COMMENTS ABOUT THE NEW SCHOOL I am called Madelene . I am now in Primary five. I am very happy to come from my holidays and start the year at new buildings of my school. Our school is very nice. Our dormitory is very good with enough light. We no longer line up for only one toilet; here at the new school there are enough. Our dining hall is well cemented; no holes. I love this school; it is totally different from that one where we were last year. |
Clean, bright, and room to play! |
Visit to England.
Two of our teaching staff recently had the opportunity to visit England for a three week study trip. Louis, the Founder of the School, and Elie, our Headteacher were able to visit various types of schools for deaf children, deaf clubs, Churches, friends and supporters as well as a bit of sightseeing. It was an amazing experience and they have come back with lots of ideas!
Louis and Elie were accompanied by Omar, a colleague from Umutara Deaf school in The Eastern Province of Rwanda, who is a good friend as well as a colleague.
Here are Elie and Louis arriving at Heathrow airport in November. It was very cold!
Here, Members of the National Parliament(Chamber of Deputies) Visited our center and our activities. They are from the Community development commission and were accompanied by Nyabihu District leaders including the Mayor and the vice Mayor in charge of Economic affairs. We are very fortunate to be visited by such Important people from the National level as they also Promised to advocate more for our Center and the people with Disabilities in General. The District leaders also promised us a stronger and more fruitful Partnership.
We thank all our visitors and invite everyone Interested to visit our work!
You are always welcome.
You are always welcome.
Sports WE won Again!!!!
AN AFRICAN CHILD HAS THE RIGHT TO LEISURE AND SPORTS
The entire Africa celebrates the International Day of African Child on 16 June every year. This is done purposely to raise the awareness of the rights of African Children. It was to mark that occasion the National Deaf Sports Committee (NDSCO) organized volley ball and basketball tournaments which took place at AMAHORO National stadium of Rwanda ; as the way of celebrating this day in the year 2016.
NPC and NDSCO leaders were present and opened the tournament officially. In the Volley ball competition, there were three teams - Nyabihu Demonstration Centre for the Deaf (NDCD), CJSM Butare and VISION Deaf Nyarugenge. Among these three teams NDCD has won the trophy.
In the basketball competition, there were also three teams - HVP-Gatagara/Nyanza, Institut Philippe Smaldone/Nyarugenge and Maison d’Accueil l’Esperance /Rulindo. In this competition, HVP-Gatagara/ Nyanza won the trophy.
The officials presented the trophies to both teams.
Sports plays a paramount role in many ways. It helps to build and maintain healthy bones, muscles, and joints; helps to control weight and reduce fat; and prevents or delays the development of high blood pressure. African children should be able to access Sports activities, just like children in other countries. And we also know that physical fitness is strongly linked to improved academic achievements.
Thus, Physical activity, and sports positively affect aspects of personal development among young people, such as self-esteem, goal-setting, and leadership. Therefore, it should be a must that each and every African child be assisted by his/her parents teachers or guardians in his/her physical, social, cognitive and educational growth and improvement through physical activities and this should be an African routine.
In the basketball competition, there were also three teams - HVP-Gatagara/Nyanza, Institut Philippe Smaldone/Nyarugenge and Maison d’Accueil l’Esperance /Rulindo. In this competition, HVP-Gatagara/ Nyanza won the trophy.
The officials presented the trophies to both teams.
Sports plays a paramount role in many ways. It helps to build and maintain healthy bones, muscles, and joints; helps to control weight and reduce fat; and prevents or delays the development of high blood pressure. African children should be able to access Sports activities, just like children in other countries. And we also know that physical fitness is strongly linked to improved academic achievements.
Thus, Physical activity, and sports positively affect aspects of personal development among young people, such as self-esteem, goal-setting, and leadership. Therefore, it should be a must that each and every African child be assisted by his/her parents teachers or guardians in his/her physical, social, cognitive and educational growth and improvement through physical activities and this should be an African routine.
We WON!!! Using the computers that Isobel had sent to us from England over the last two years, Louis was able to enter the TIGO competition. It is an ICT competition to help disadvantaged people out of poverty by increasing their ICT skills. With the money, we have been able to buy new laptops, employ an ICT teacher and build computer stations.
- Since April 2015, our Center is now a partner with Chance for Childhood an English charity working in Rwanda to help children with hearing impairments.To summarise, this is what they are helping us with:
- Topping up our ordinary budget, for example: helping us with rent costs, food expenses, and teachers salaries.
- Funding 2 new teachers and a Head Teacher as well as giving a salary to the Director of the centre And guess this one!!!
- They have enabled us to enrol 54 new children to our center. These children were identified by CfC in their project called Empowerment, Equity, and Education(EEE), which aims to identify children in specific rural areas of Rwanda who have significant hearing loss and are not in school. So as a partner organization, we will benefit from the EEE work by having these newly identified children. We were very excited to accept the responsibility to care for this large number of children, who without us would have no access to education or communication development. Our Centre has now grown in number to 130 children.
We continue to appreciate the funding which we have from an English Rotary Club and the Rotary Club of Kigali which will pays for two teachers. The qualified teachers that are employed are working well and have become experienced in teaching deaf children. This means that our Centre can continue to develop and improve, both in the facilities we can offer these children and in improved quality of education.
Football News!
25/feb/2015: Deaf sports day
On this day in partnership with Chance for Childhood ,VSO(voluntary service overseas ) and NPC(National Paralympic committee ) they had organized a Deaf sports day simply because deaf people don’t attend any Paralympic games
So our Center was Invited along with seven others, to take part in the games. We had 3 weeks to prepare for the competition.
The event was to take place at the Amahoro National stadium in Kigali. We travelled from Nyabihu on the morning of the competition, and should have been very tired because it was a 125kms journey, but we were very ecited. When we arrived we had a warm up of around 30 minutes
On this day in partnership with Chance for Childhood ,VSO(voluntary service overseas ) and NPC(National Paralympic committee ) they had organized a Deaf sports day simply because deaf people don’t attend any Paralympic games
So our Center was Invited along with seven others, to take part in the games. We had 3 weeks to prepare for the competition.
The event was to take place at the Amahoro National stadium in Kigali. We travelled from Nyabihu on the morning of the competition, and should have been very tired because it was a 125kms journey, but we were very ecited. When we arrived we had a warm up of around 30 minutes
As soon as everyone arrived we started a very successful sports day. because in brief we went back home with the Athletic's Trophy as the team who have won most gold medals in running, four gold medals, and three silvers. As well as this, in the football we came home as runners up with each of our players receiving a silver medal, as you can see in the pictures