Jaqmashi’s School
Exchange Project:
Tupe (Peru) –
Giessenlanden (Netherlands)
Stef de Haan
This project to bring together primary schools in the rural villages of Tupe (Peru) and Giessenlanden (Netherlands) is based on the idea of exchange between children from different cultural backgrounds, and is in keeping with the deeply-rooted Andean tradition of reciprocity. By promoting knowledge of one another’s culture, history, concerns and livelihoods, through education, we hope that this initiative can lead to greater solidarity and to a better understanding of cultural diversity across the globe.
Dutch teachers, schoolchildren and their parents at the Het Tweespan primary school in Giessenlanden organized a number of activities in their village to raise awareness of the indigenous culture of the Andes. The school organised a term around this theme, so that the Dutch schoolchildren could learn about the history and richness of the Quechua, Aymara and Jaqaru cultures, not only through exercises with their teachers but also through a photo exhibition, and a presentation supported by the Andean Foundation of the Netherlands. To round off all these activities, the children from Giessenlanden went round their village to collect toys, pencils and other useful materials to donate to the primary schools in Tupe. They also sold their own drawings and other things they had made at school in order to raise a financial donation too. All activities were recorded in a photo album, a copy of which was also sent to Tupe.
The remote mountain villages of Tupe, Aiza and Colca (Yauyos province, Lima department, Peru) are the only remaining villages where the endangered Jaqaru language is still spoken, by under a thousand people. There is one primary school in each village, and one secondary school in Tupe, the largest village of the three. Children in each school made drawings and wrote poems in Jaqaru for their counterparts in Giessenlanden, expressions of life in their villages in order to give their personal view of growing up in Tupe, for schoolchildren on the other side of the world.
Through this project, children raised in the unique Jaqaru culture, and in a rural Dutch community, have been able to learn about each other and their cultures. On both sides the exercise was perceived as an extremely valuable one that helped promote awareness of and respect for cultural diversity from an early age.
The financial donation from the children, parents and teachers of Het Tweespan was topped up by another from the Giessenlanden village council. A total of 2 430 Euros were donated to the schools in the Jaqaru-speaking villages. These resources have been used so far in order to:
• complete the publication of a first textbook for education in the Jaqaru language;
• produce classroom posters on a range of themes (body parts, animals, etc.), as further educational materials in Jaqaru;
• acquire musical instruments for music education, and to help support the preservation of local folklore;
• improve the primary schools’ infrastructure, by paying for materials to repair walls and doors, and to build school toilets;
• purchase other materials and equipment needed by the school, such as a typewriter and pupils’ textbooks.
Alongside our Bilingual Education Programme for
the Jaqaru-speaking villages, the Jaqmashi
Association has thus brought together the children
from primary schools from two very different countries and cultures. The direct contacts between the
schoolchildren, and their activities on behalf of each other, have proven
highly motivating for all involved, and very successful in raising awareness on
both sides. We hope that our school
exchange might serve as a model to encourage similar initiatives to support
other peoples whose language and cultures are under threat in the same way as
is Jaqaru.
Jaqmashi Bilingual Education Programme