The school is situated on the north coast of Dominican Republic in a small town called Cabarete. This town was once a small fishing village; now it has become an international tourist town labeled as the extreme sports capital of the Caribbean. Miguelina's background: She grew up in this same Dominican Village. She was the youngest of 18 children! Since she was a little girl she would ask herself the question, “what do I want to do with my life?” She knew that she didn’t want to live the same type of life as her parents or the people in her community; most of them couldn’t read or write and were very poor. Even at her young age she was able to see that there were other possibilities. Instinctively, she knew that if she could educate herself and learn English then she could change her destiny and the destiny of the people in her community. She said, “no one else was helping them.”
She wasn’t sure exactly how she was going to do it, but she knew she needed money to help achieve her dreams. So at 8-years old she started selling apples, oranges and avocados on the side of the road. She continued to work, go to school and save her money. She was an excellent student who worked very hard. When she was 13 years old she began in her spare time to teach her nieces and nephews the little bit of English she had learned. At age 15 she started to teach other children after school (school in the Dominican Republic is only 3 1/2 hours per day) and received 10 pesos per child per week, which is approximately 30 cents, but some parents couldn’t afford to pay even this. Regardless, Miguelina kept at it all the while sensing that the younger children of her community were missing out on a very important opportunity to learn. There was no such thing as pre-school, so she decided to start one. I don’t think Miguelina set out with the intention to become one of the most inspirational people in her community but she did know exactly how she was going to help others, by educating them. She asked her dad if she could use an old property he had so she could teach the children there. He agreed and in two small shacks with leaky roofs, dirt floors and discarded appliances in the playground, the Escuela Centro de Ensenanza Coral was born! Life continued…
She graduated high school, got married and started to have a family of her own. The school was still going strong, more and more parents were enrolling their kids in the preschool. Unfortunately, Miguelina had to start turning them away as the two shacks couldn’t hold anymore students. However, Miguelina’s dream doesn’t end there, instead it expanded. She decided to build an elementary school with classes through to grade 6 with real classrooms and resources. She and Gustavo (her husband) had managed to save enough money to buy some land next to where they lived and whenever they had any extra money they would buy cement blocks. Slowly, one block at a time construction began and then stopped when they had no more money, and then began and stopped again, and began and stopped again. It was a heart wrenching process not knowing from one week to the next if they would have enough money for the next stage of construction. Even though the odds of building the school seemed stacked against them, Miguelina was undeterred. She had an unwavering faith in the "Higher Power". Through her hard work, dedication and generous support of a few dedicated foreigners who have been touched by Miguelina’s quest she received enough money to finish the school! The new school opened in September 2005. Even though the building was mostly a shell, with no windows and doors, the beauty of the dream and the obvious learning that was taking place was apparent as soon as you walked through the door. Since September 2005 the school has had windows and doors donated. All of the classrooms are colorfully painted. There are four working toilets instead of the original one. A new school playground was donated and the school now has 13 teachers! These are indeed very lucky children who will have a far better chance of changing their future and the future of their country with their education. This is no small feat when you consider the Dominican Republic’s dismal track record in education. According to a report released during the Global Education Forum, most students in the Dominican educational system aren't getting the basic educational tools needed to succeed. When Miguelina accepts new children into her school from the public school system, often the children don’t even know how to read. Miguelina is a very busy person with four children of her own, yet she managed to recently complete her Masters of Education! Not only was she running her school and teaching but traveled 4 hours every Saturday to attend University! She is the only one in her family to finish high school! Miguelina and her family live very humbly; any extra money goes into subsidizing the school for the many children whose parents cannot afford to consistently pay the monthly tuition. Her next goal was to build a second floor on the school so they could accept more children. In the photos you will see that this dream is also becoming a reality. Miguelina’s fortitude, hard-work, dedication and faith combined with the generosity and kindness from the sponsors has helped to make the dream of providing a better education to the Dominican children a reality! Thank you to everyone and please, please pass this on to anyone whom you feel may want to help. Times are tougher than ever in Cabarete as tourists numbers here have consistently been declining. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!!
