Although Rwanda offers free primary education, some parents can’t afford pre-primary education. For children whose parents can’t afford to pay for nursery education, they wait till the children turn five or six to start primary one. 

Having this in mind, Milcah Grace Aziz got a calling to help struggling parents with free pre-primary education for their children. This year, Aziz opened a school, Little Flowers School, which offers free education to the helpless children of Muhima.

Aziz is also the head teacher and director of The Blooming Buds School in Kiyovu, a private school. Located at Muhima right opposite APACOPE, the school doesn’t have a sign post at the entrance but the green gate is easy to spot.

Once you enter the gate, the noise from the kids is enough to confirm that it’s a kindergarten. The sound of children reciting the alphabet and rhymes in English and French echoes around.

Aziz says that it was her constant interaction with children at Muhima (they called her ‘Muyindi’, meaning Indian) that inspired her into starting the nursery school.

Chantal Umulisa is a resident of Muhima sector, Nyarungenge district. She is a single mother of two. Her eldest daughter; Hasine Uwayisaba is seven years old and a beneficiary of Little Flowers.

"I had to send my daughter to the village to my mother, because as a single mother it was hard to take care of the two children since I had just given birth. She was not able to attend nursery school because I didn’t have the resources. But I’m so glad that an opportunity like Little Flowers has provided a chance for my daughter, one that I didn’t get while growing up,” Umulisa says.

Umulisa is a vegetable vendor, something she says she is not excited about, but she has to make ends meet.

"When I brought back my daughter from the village to start school, she was shy and dull and did not easily interact with other children. I’m happy to say that the few months she has been at this school, she has become very confident and is able to communicate in English and French,” Umulisa says.

Aziz came to Rwanda in 2011 as a housewife with her husband who had landed a job as an IT consultant. "We were living at Muhima and as Christians; we started hosting prayers at our home. We started having Sunday school for children around the village. I would give children things to paint and write, that’s when I realised they didn’t fully participate because they lacked the skills and knowledge.

Early childhood is a very important stage of life for a child’s physical, intellectual, emotional and social development,” Aziz says.

Aziz felt the need to teach these children because they could not express themselves and did not know how to paint or write. Aware that their parents could not afford to pay, she offered the service free of charge.

"We had planned to offer free education to only 20 children but when we set up an office at Muhima to register the family and children that could benefit from this project, many people showed up telling us how they didn’t have resources to take the children to nursery school. We decided to increase the number to thirty but still more people came in and the numbers kept on increasing. Now we currently have a total of 93 students. Parents used to parade at the office that at some point it became overwhelming. They were desperate. It was a tough time for us,” Aziz recalls.

Aziz adds that they had to visit the families of the children that benefit from the free education programme to see if indeed they were eligible.

"The families we visited and registered indeed needed to be helped. Although more people wanted to register their children, we could not take them on because we don’t have any sponsors. I’m not rich and the money we use to facilitate the school by the grace of God is from me and my husband. Some of the money is proceeds from The Blooming Buds,” Aziz explains.

Aziz who is a teacher by profession says that most of the learning material that the children use at Little Flowers School is handmade.

"For example the furniture, blackboards and other scholastic equipment like the abacus were made by some of the parents and some people of the Muhima community,” Aziz says.

The mother of an eight-year-old girl and four-year-old boy has an impressive education background that includes, masters in English, masters in journalism, masters in psychology, post graduate diploma in phonetics, just to mention a few.

"I really enjoy studying and I’m currently doing a PhD in English at the University of Osmania, Hyderabad India,” Aziz says.

When asked how she is able to juggle work, family and studying, she says: "It has not been very difficult because my husband is so supportive in whatever I do that without him I don’t think I would be able to pursue my dreams.”

doreen.umutesi@newtimes.co.rw