Education

Access to quality education in Mexico and Guatemala continues to be challenging, especially in rural and indigenous areas.

The causes are many. 

There are systemic barriers, economic inequalities, and geographic isolation. Many schools lack basic infrastructure, such as books, electricity, and clean water. Girls in poor indigenous areas face cultural barriers, including societal norms that prioritize boys' education. 

Additionally, indigenous students often struggle due to language barriers. 

According to UNESCO, intercultural bilingual education (IBE) programs that incorporate Mayan languages are improving inclusion and learning outcomes. However, in our personal experience, it’s common for the public school system bilingual teachers to be assigned to communities that speak a different Mayan language than the one they speak. 

Viewed from the outside, it’s difficult to know if that is caused by systemic design or from oblivious ineptitude. It's probably a bit of both, but it really doesn’t matter, because the result is the same. Despite thousands of bilingual teachers, the primary language in the classrooms of most indigenous areas is almost always Spanish.  

Poor, marginalized communities have little influence on the government educational policies, but they can provide educational support to children outside of the classroom. As a cultural phenomenon, it's interesting how often rural indigenous communities find ways to create infrastructures that provide bilingual educational support for young students. (ANADESA, Pueblo a Pueblo, Puerta Abierta, Ruk'ux, Yo'onik.) 

Children who learn Spanish during their first few years of school are more likely to at least finish sixth grade. While it’s true that completing sixth grade is more likely than it was for previous generations, in poor rural areas there are many factors still working against it.

According to the World Bank, approximately 59% of the population in Guatemala lives below the poverty line, which forces families to prioritize daily survival over education. So even if young students learn Spanish well enough to continue passing from one grade to the next, often they must leave school at a young age to help support their families financially. 

Therefore, graduating from sixth grade is still a very big deal in many places.

Scholarships ameliorate many of the expenses associated with higher levels of education. However, most of the students in Natik’s partner scholarship programs also work so they can contribute to the family wellbeing. 

Natik could tell many stories about the impact of education, but the most powerful is that all the leaders of Natik's partnership organizations completed secondary, high school, and university levels thanks to scholarships. Their families wouldn't have been able to afford the tuition, uniforms, study materials, and transportation in addition to the loss of the full time salary of that child. 

Over time, we'll share some of the details of individual success stories. For now, the important thing is for you to know that the leaders of Natik's partners understand what the children, adolescents, and young adults in their programs are experiencing--- because they lived the same challenges when they were in school. 

That is a priceless gift for the students, their families, and their communities.