Beans or Books?

By Gabriel B. Brunnich, Advocacy Intern

Educational Landscape

Nestled in among the low-lying hills around Leon, surrounded by tamarind and jícaro trees, rolling fields of corn, sesame and wheat, and set against a majestic backdrop of towering volcanoes, lies the small rural community of El Chague. A community of just under 800 residents, El Chague is a village that despite its high level of organization and strong partnerships with a number of civil society organizations such as PMGL, is also one that is facing significant hurdles as it struggles to meet the needs of its residents. A community with neither electricity nor running water, El Chague also lacks a health center and secondary school. Claiming one preschool (housed in a local resident’s open air living room) and one three-room primary school, El Chague offers little possibility of pursuing an education after the 6th grade.

Entering secondary school thus often remains little more than an unattainable dream for many residents. While pursuing a secondary school education in Leon is a possibility for some, transportation to Leon is often simply too expensive for many. Even if the government were to reinstate reduced fares for students, the two daily camionetas between El Chague and Leon (7am and 1pm) do not coincide with school hours. And for many families, simply purchasing necessary school supplies and uniforms are enough of a financial strain to keep attending secondary school out of the realm of possibilities.

The adolescent girls in the sewing group in El Chague for example, all of whom are either completing their last year at the primary school or who have already finished their primary school studies, have identified the lack of transportation as one of the most significant road blocks to continuing their education. While some of them who have access to a bicycle are able to attend school in the town of Las Brisas on Saturdays, there are many who cannot, thus ending their education at the age of 12.

Doña Lucia, the teacher of the sewing group, as well as Marta Elena Santana, one of the primary school teachers in El Chague, also spoke of how for many families in the community, there is simply not enough money to purchase needed school supplies. Ms. Santana added that many parents often keep their children at home in order to help with the housework, watch younger siblings or work in the fields, rather than send them to school. The money the children can earn by working, and the money they can save by not purchasing school supplies are often too significant for families with extremely scarce resources to ignore. In such cases, Ms. Santana tries to explain to the parents the importance of sending their children to school at least two or three times a week, in order that they have at least a minimum opportunity to learn to read and write.

The stories told by the residents of El Chague however, are far from being particular to their community. Many rural communities across Nicaragua are suffering similar challenges. Despite increases in the general level of education since the early nineties, illiteracy still remains a major problem in Nicaragua, particularly in rural areas. According to statistics from the World Bank and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), over 20% of the Nicaraguan population is illiterate, and one quarter of all rural youth are unable to read and write. The UNDP further reports that in 2001, the average number of years of schooling was a mere 5.1 years, with rural areas reporting significantly fewer (4.0 for the Rural Pacific, 2.7 for the Rural Central, and 2.5 for the Rural Caribbean).

In addition to these discouraging educational statistics, the average economic contribution of students and families to cover educational costs have in fact gone up significantly for both secondary and higher education. With the Nicaraguan government being pushed to decrease its debt through decreasing spending, it has searched for ways other than through the use of public funds to finance various services such as education and electricity. The electric company for example has been completely privatized, and in education, parents have been asked to pay “voluntary” monthly school charges (cuotas) to help cover school operating costs.

While these contributions are technically voluntary, if individual families do not pay the monthly quotas, the schools will simply not have enough basic materials to function properly. Furthermore as it has been found that “a family’s willingness to pay fees is linked closely to income,” schools in poor communities consequently suffer disproportionately from a lack of resources. Ramon Zavala, member of the Southern Council and computer class professor at the public university as well as at a secondary school in Leon, has expressed disdain and frustration regarding this educational policy, calling it nothing less than the privatization of public education.

Nicaragua is thus finding itself in a very contradictory situation in which families’ financial contributions to education are on the rise, while 1/3 of all children and adolescents are dropping out of school due to lack of sufficient financial resources. How can this be given that the Law of Educational Participation, article 16 (2002) clearly states that no one can be excluded from receiving an education for economic reasons? The national constitution furthermore outlines that the State has the responsibility to facilitate access, guarantee quality and equity of financial and material resources. As for the youth in El Chague, they have yet to see their government put these words into action.

Economic Landscape

Deysi Sanchez and Orlando Sarria, both members of the Southern Council and educators with many years of experience in the classroom as well as in educational administrations, cite poverty, particularly that in rural areas, as the principal challenge facing the educational system in Nicaragua. Classified by the World Bank as one of poorest and least developed countries in Latin America, Nicaragua clearly faces an uphill battle in addressing poverty and in meeting the educational needs of its citizens. In fact, according to the UNDP, almost half of Nicaraguan households are living in poverty, while 15% of Nicaraguan households are living in extreme poverty, defined as living on less than $1 per day.

Although poverty at the national level has declined significantly since the nineties, poverty and extreme poverty continue to be overwhelmingly rural, with more than 25% of people living in rural areas suffering from extreme poverty. (Extreme poverty is approximately 6% in urban areas). Consequently, families with limited resources are then often forced to choose between beans and books. In such cases, it is common that everyone in the family works to contribute to the family’s budget, with older children staying home to watch over the house and the younger children, clean, and take care of household chores, or engaging in income generating activities themselves.

Poverty disproportionately affecting the rural sector

On the eve of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) going in to effect, the implications of free trade and economic globalization are once again in the spot light, and for good reason. While the Bush administration hails CAFTA as a prime opportunity to increase the reach and flexibility of international trade and its many purported economic benefits, hundreds of thousands of people in Nicaragua and across Central America are protesting this massive trade agreement, viewing CAFTA as a death knell to local farmers, the environment, labor standards and the security of public services, which risk being sold to private companies concerned only in making a profit. Claims of privatized public services improving quality at a reduced cost have been disproved time and again. Such is the case with the Spanish company, Union Fenosa which now runs Nicaragua’s electric company. Yet despite these risks, CAFTA supporters forge ahead, attempting to pass this free trade agreement into law.

With Nicaragua already struggling to be competitive on the international commodities market, should CAFTA become a reality, local farmers being able to sell at anything but a loss becomes a much more ominous possibility. With trade barriers being so drastically reduced, Central American staple crops such as corn, rice and beans will not only become more vulnerable to wild fluctuations in price on the international market (which can lead to farm bankruptcy and massive rural exodus to urban centers), but they will also be forced to compete with highly subsidized American commodities that can be sold under cost.

How can the rural sector in Nicaragua, or that in any developing country for that matter, possibly hope to sell at a profit (or at all) when faced with such unjust trade conditions? How can small farmers such as those in El Chague support their children’s education when on the one hand they are facing increased school costs, and on the other hand they are facing decreasing sale prices for their goods? Clearly the answer is that they cannot. Only when the State can fulfill its promise to provide free, high quality education that is accessible to all, will illiteracy in rural Nicaragua truly begin to diminish. And only until all farmers can compete as equals on a level playing field, will “free trade” continue to be anything but.

So what can we as individual citizens of the United States do to act in solidarity with the people in Nicaragua in their struggle to receive an education and earn a dignified wage? How can we fight against the insidious effects of poverty, the dangerous privatizing of public services such as education, and the continued marginalization of rural communities such as El Chague?

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