Trek Team Helps Bring Education to Village,
Rain or Shine
by Melissa Sanseverino, Trek Team Leader, NY & CT
August 2008
A community called “Villa Austria” might not sound like it belongs in Central America, but that is the name of a Nicaraguan village where thirteen buildOn members helped to build a school this summer. The CT Trek for Knowledge team arrived in Nicaragua on July 8th and traveled by bus into the northern mountains to meet the families that would host them. Team members spent two weeks working side by side with their host parents and siblings to dig and pour the foundation for the first school the community has ever had.
The team, made up of students and teachers from seven different high schools in New York and Connecticut, had a chance to learn some Spanish, milk some cows, and eat plenty of rice and beans. The group also took a walk down to the Rio Coco to dip their toes in the water and find out more about the history of Villa Austria. From Dona Veronica, a community organizer, they learned about the catastrophic flooding caused by Hurricane Mitch in the fall of 1998. The 200 residents of Villa Austria, then known by an indigenous name, lost all but three of their houses to the engorged, raging river.
Although an Austrian charity later helped them to rebuild further up the bank, flooding is still a problem in Villa Austria each year during the rainy season. When the river rises above the road, children can’t make the walk to school in the neighboring pueblo of Telpaneca.
But, when the buildOn school is completed in a few weeks, rain will no longer keep those children from going to class. And just as the finishing touches are being put on the school at the end of August, members of the Trek team will be going back to class at their high schools and sharing their Nicaraguan Trek experience with hundreds of other students.
At a tearful farewell ceremony at the end of Trek, Kemiosha Allston, a buildOn member from the Bronx, spoke for the team. She expressed her gratitude for the hospitality of her Nicaraguan family and explained that she felt honored to be able to help make the education of Villa Austria’s children possible. Another team member, Max Eyes from Norwalk, CT, wrote a speech for the ceremony in Spanish. He got a laugh out of the gloomy crowd when he told them that he would miss everything about Nicaragua- except the mosquitoes.
For Max and Kemiosha and their teammates, the Trek for Knowledge to Nicaragua was an unforgettable adventure.