Education
Education is extremely important to the future of the people of South Omo. Education will empower the community for the future! Koibe is the Malle tribal center and services approximately 100,000 people. Currently, there is only 1 school for grades 1 - 8. In 2007, approximately 1800 students enrolled and in 2008 about 2300. Class sizes are upwards of 60 students with an extreme lack of supplies and necessities; the blackboard often being the only teaching aid instructors have.
Among the subjects taught is English. The people realize that the ability to communicate with the outside world could provide opportunities not previously afforded.
Conditions are extremely harsh. It is difficult, in South Omo, to keep teachers on staff. The community has to house the teachers, so they build pole and grass huts for them. The teachers will put up with these conditions for a time, but will not bring their families to join them.
Classrooms are primitive and are also made from poles and grass. Some of them are mudded to help them last a little longer. They have poor lighting; just what's available from small windows. There is no electricity. These huts consist of dirt floors, log benches and desks that are uncomfortable for both student and teacher.
Children bring bundles of wood to help with the fires for cooking the noon meal that is often supplied. These meals are cooked in large pots on open fires. They eat outside wherever they can find a spot... God's cafeteria!
The toilets and latrines are filthy! This particular unit is in Koibe and services 1,500 students! Most children avoid using them altogether opting for nature's latrine instead!
More and more, families are beginning to understand the benefits to education and desire to send their children to school. Girls are slowly being allowed to attend as well as the boys! A program to give a family a bottle of cooking oil for every girl they allow to go to school has helped in this regard.
Education is still not the priority it needs to be, though. Often, because the tribes of South Omo are nomadic, the children can attend school only when they've travelled close enough to the area the school is. When it's time to move on, the children are taken out of school and their education ceases.
