Over 7,800 Burundian children at Mahama camp start school

AT LEAST 7,800 Burundian children in Mahama Refugee Camp in Kirehe District are expected to start school at the beginning of next academic year if conditions back home have not changed to allow repatriation. Next academic year will start in January 2016 but the Burundian children will start with an orientation programme next Monday, which will help acquaint them with the Rwandan education system, according to aid workers. Rwanda currently hosts over 43,000 Burundian refugees, the majority of them children who left schools due to political instability linked to presidential and parliamentary elections in the country. The parliamentary elections were held on Monday while the presidential polls are expected to take place on July 15. According to an official from the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA-Rwanda), the six-month induction programme will help the young Burundians get used to the Rwandan education system which is different from Burundi’s. Speaking to The New Times, David Muyambi, a humanitarian field officer with ADRA, said that during the six months, they will also embark on an exercise to evaluate the school children who will be put in different groups due to their competencies. “Some of them do not have academic records to show their levels. Some may take advantage of the situation and skip classes. An evaluation is needed to ensure they are placed in suitable grades.” Muyambi said. English and Kinyarwanda are the main languages used in schools here while in Burundi it is French and their native Kirundi. More than 150 makeshift classrooms have been constructed at Mahama camp to accommodate orientation education programme to educate and induct the children into the Rwanda system of education. The school children will be taught English, Kinyarwanda, mathematics, and pedagogy until December, this year. Kirehe District has provided 100 trainers to facilitate the process, while other trainers are Burundian teachers who are among the refugees. When contacted, Frederic Ntawukuriryayo, the Public Relations and Communication Officer at the Ministry of Disaster Management and Refugee Affairs, said that despite the development, their wish is to ensure peace returns and the refugees return to their country. “The programme is for children of school-going age. The temporary classrooms were constructed expecting the refugees to remain in Rwanda until next year. However, it may happen that the refugees will have returned to their country by next year,” he said.

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Over 7,800 Burundian children at Mahama camp start school