What a week! All things considered, it was a relatively smooth start to the new school year at Cowman.
Or ... we've gotten used to chaotic school starts!
Hurricane Irma threw us a curve ball the previous week and put us a bit further behind in prepping our new upstairs rooms for our Middle School and High School classes. Fortunately, we were relatively unscathed by the storm itself since the winds never grew too powerful in our area.
Just enough to take out a couple of large branches:
By Monday morning, Cowman was ready to welcome the grade schoolers to class.
And by Monday afternoon my classroom was finally pulled together for my literature and writing classes for the older students.
Looks pretty sharp, huh? We have five new classrooms for this school year and we are using them all!
By Tuesday morning, after weeks of moving furniture, cleaning shelves and organizing EVERYTHING, Melissa and I were ready to line the kids up for their traditional first day photo, load up the pickup truck and head to Cowman to start the REAL work.
6th, 7th and 8th grade are all together this year, giving us 31 in Cowman Middle School. Some day we'll have lockers, but for now each middle schooler has a shelf in Mr. Adams' history room, keeping the chaos somewhat contained!
Melissa and I are in denial about now having three high school students in the family. Samuel is a freshman? Impossible!
Caleb is a junior (!) and Hannah is a sophomore (!!) and together our kids make up more than a fifth of Cowman High School's student body of 14.
And our youngest, Sarah, is a 5th grader! She is so excited to be doing math on the computer this year - like her older siblings have been doing for several years. She's thrilled to have her "own" computer, even though it's just Melissa's old clunker with a few new stickers applied.
When we moved to Haiti four years ago, Cowman started the year with 65 students or so. We've tripled in size since then! It's hard to believe but from our 3-year-olds to our high school juniors, Cowman now has 188 students!
More students means more staff. Melissa has hired a few new staff members for this school year. A couple have personal ties with me. A couple of days before the hurricane, I went downtown Cap Haitien to buy a couple of new fans for our home. Now, Cap is a quarter of a million people, but it amazes me how often I see someone I know. On this particular day, Oles came running across the street after I had parked and offered to help me negotiate a good price for a fan.
Oles was in my adult English class two years ago and was an outstanding student with a great personality and gentle spirit. I asked him if he had ever been successful in getting a job at the bank as he had messaged me over the summer. No, they hadn't even called him back after the interview.
The next day, Melissa told me she was still looking for a teaching assistant for Mr. James in 4th grade and I said, "I know who you should call!"
Now here he is...
Melissa was also looking for some part-time help in the preschool classes since we are trying to provide healthy snacks to the kids this year in an effort to avoid the crazy energy and mood swings from the ample sugar and grease contained by the junk food sent from home over the past few years.
Lo and behold, Ruysdael's mom, Madeliene, was available and ready to give the new position a try.
Through these past few weeks, Melissa has seen her fair share of challenges in her new role as principal, and the first full week of classes continued the trend. With 188 students now being dropped off and picked up in a very small parking lot, traffic flow has become a leading cause of frustration for EVERYONE. Melissa's been working out a system that shows promise now that drivers are starting to get the hang of it.
It still requires a lot of hands on attention from Melissa - on Friday, she and Val and several other workers got caught in a tropical downpour during dismissal:
Speaking of Val, I'd like to conclude with some fairly urgent prayer requests:
Hurricane Irma really disrupted a lot of travel plans, including Val's. She ended up spending almost a week longer with us than she intended to and now she's going to miss a vacation with extended family as a result. Pray patience and comfort and strength for her, if you would. She has done so much for Cowman over the last few weeks and we will look forward to seeing her again soon.
Also, the government here recently announced some tax hikes and the news did not go over well with a lot of citizens. There are "demonstrations" rumored for this week in Port-au-Prince and in Cap. This has the potential to disrupt our school calendar and frustrate travel plans, not to mention the threat of violence. Please pray for peace.
Furthermore, there's a new hurricane headed our way - Maria. She's building in intensity and right now we are in the cone for Thursday. Again, at the very least this threatens to disrupt our school week. God spared us from Irma, please pray that Maria would dissipate and disappear. NOBODY, in these islands or in Florida, needs another hurricane right now.
Finally, in the midst of all this turmoil, our math teacher, Mr. Love, received news last week that his father was dying. He flew out the next day but was unable to make it back to Indiana before his dad passed away. Now Mrs. Love (our science teacher) and their son Camden are hoping to fly out tomorrow for the funeral. The loss of a family member is a heavy burden by itself, but this is being complicated by tricky travel plans and the need to leave instructions for classes science and math classes to be covered in their absence - when they can't even begin to predict the length of that absence. Our hearts break for them and so we ask for your prayers to join ours - prayers for comfort and peace, protection and strength. May the Good Shepherd guide them and their extended family through this particularly difficult Valley of the Shadow of Death.
Thanks for all your prayers and support!
