Institut Notre Dame de la Médaille Miraculeuse

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The “Institut Notre Dame de la Médaille Miraculeuse" is a Haitian socio-educational work that is both a school enrolling 350 underprivileged children and a center of life for 85 abandoned children, orphans, survivors of the earthquake, former servants, or from very poor living conditions.
The organization was founded in 2007 and is located in Cap Haitien. With the help of national and international partners and sponsors, we provide our children with food, health care, and a quality educational environment.

SCHOOL
Historical
The “Ecole Notre Dame de la Médaille Miraculeuse” was founded in 2001. The school started with a class of 24 children opened along Shada slum in Cap Haitien.
Following the donation of land on the outskirts of the city, the current school was built and today provides education to 350 underprivileged children coming from surrounding neighborhoods.
Schooling
The school provides education from nursery school to junior high school.
School starts at 8 am and ends at 13h.
Currently 29 teachers are involved in the school.

Details
The school has 12 classrooms and a multi sports ground (basketball, volleyball, tennis).
The school also has 2 sanitary blocks for girls and boys.
The administration has a large desk and a room where installed workstations and office of the secretary. The school also has a dining hall.

Pedagogy
Furthermore Haitian education professionals, the Institute hosted for the period 2014/2015 a Volunteer of International Solidarity, educational director, a specialist in education in primary school.
In addition, the school host throughout the year international volunteers involved directly in classes in the subjects in which they are experts or for events and cultural activities.

Cultural and sporting activities
A school party is organized in December to celebrate the end of the year. Shows, songs, theater, dance, etc. are prepared and presented by the students.
A football tournament is also organized for the occasion.
Cultural outings are organized for the schoolchildren throughout the year.

ORPHANAGE
Historical
The orphanage/living center was opened in 2007 to help children among the poorest to access basic education, and decent living conditions.
By opening this center, we not only offer free education to orphans and poor children, but also a house, daily food, health care and a quality human environment.

Children
There are 85 children from 2 to 25 years old.
They are grouped by gender and age, living in different houses.
In each house lives a house master, who has to manage discipline and logistics (clothing, cleaning, etc.).
All the children in the center are enrolled in the Ecole Notre Dame de la Médaille Miraculeuse. The eldest are going in high school downtown. The institute, through sponsors, covers tuition fees for these students.

In detail
The orphanage consists of various houses, in the center of which there is a grass-covered yard.
The children center has a kitchen, a saddler, and a large dining hall where children eat with the supervisory staff. This large room is the space dedicated to certain educational and / or recreational activities, such as the screening of films and cartoons on television, dance lessons, songs, rehearsals, etc.
The orphanage also has 3 offices, a meeting room, 3 bedrooms to accommodate visitors, an infirmary, a laundry room, a library and a toy library.

The study and entertainments
Children at the center are occupied every day, in the afternoon, by study activities (homework) and/or entertainment (singing, dancing, drawing, sports, etc.), led by a team of educators, from 12pm to 5:30pm.
This supervised studying time gives to our children a better school achievement and the majority of them represents the best students of the school.