Feature Photo: The Home Economics students at DIVIT RTC.
Ashley Bulgarelli checks in one last time as he tours the Solomon Islands.
My five days in the Solomon Islands have flown by in a whirlwind of meetings, site visitations and joyful faces. It started at the Marists St Joseph’s College in Tenaru where the school principal, Abraham, met me for the morning. We toured around the school and saw the new administration block under construction, went to the site of the new staff houses co-funded by many AMS donors, while Abraham shared his hopes and dreams for this burgeoning and very academically successful school. As someone told me later, ‘the Government schools are jealous because St Joseph’s is the best performing school in Honiara yet they run on a shoestring’. As I tempered the midday sun by sitting on a bench in the middle of the school yard underneath a cavernous tree, I felt privileged to be able to support these achievements in our own unique way.
The following day I met with the new Archbishop of Honiara, Chris Cardone OP, and visited a local Diocesan school that was built and run entirely by parents in its early years. Known as a man of the people after 17 years in the Solomon Islands, Archbishop Chris and I capped off the day by having lunch at a local eatery full of inquisitive faces. In a country where the Church is the social fabric of society, the young girls taking the lunch order of the Archbishops were in a state of shock.
I also visited two Rural Training Centres (RTC’s) – DIVIT RTC and San Isidro RTC. RTC’s are an important feature of the education landscape in the Solomon Islands and give opportunities to youths and young adults to learn vocational skills. The Marist Missionary Sisters are involved in San Isidro RTC which is specifically for those who are deaf and mute. It is a remarkable place where the students age in range from 14 to 40, and most have never been to school before and know limited sign language. The four year course equips these vulnerable people with essential life skills so that they can return to their villages with maximum independence and skills to earn an income. San Isidro RTC is a place of great importance for the deaf community as it is the only place in the Solomon Islands for those older children and adults who are deaf. Many of their students previously thought that they were the only person like them.
The one thing that struck me while in the Solomon Islands is the strong family commitment to education in all the projects I visited. I saw unprecedented levels of support from families for the schools and RTC’s where their child (or adult) attends. Despite not being monetarily rich, the families give what they can to develop these places for the current and future generation. There is a great sense of pride and happiness. The numberplate slogan on vehicles could not be closer to the truth – ‘Solomon Islands – The Happy Isles’.