DREAM Center

With no school this week (spring break if you will) we're doing some atypical things around here. Yesterday through tomorrow we're having a training seminar for a group of interested Dominicans that teach in some of the schools that we support. This is actually the third seminar of the year that is being put on in conjunction with an organization called Step By Step. Step By Step is a global organization that is looking to improve the education and teaching methods in countries around the world. Although I am not too involved in this project, I believe it to be a very important part of what we're doing here. I don't think there is going to be any significant change until the Dominican teachers and education administrators change the way they teach and the entire structure of the educational system. Hopefully this will be one part of that process.

This would also be a good time to mention another significant achievement for the DREAM Project this year. A few weeks ago, we opened a building that we're calling the DREAM Center. This building is located in the Dominican neighborhood known as the Callejon de la Loma and will be a multipurpose building that will serve many different needs in that community. It will be a school, teacher training center, and a general community center. The center is not completely finished, but we have been able to open it up on a limited basis with a preschool class utilizing Montessori methods. The difference between this classroom and the ones that are seen in the basic public schools is amazing. The size of the classrooms at the DREAM Center are about twice as big, and the resources we have for the preschool class are like nothing seen in the other classrooms. As previously stated, this builing will be used for many other purposes as the building is completed, and will hopefully be a central part of what we accomplish in this area.

The classes that go on at the DREAM Center will be part of the public school system, but the building was privately funded through various donations and is only a reality due to the hard work of many members of the DREAM Project and this community. An official opening is planned with a dinner and ribbon cutting and all that good stuff for April 13. Unfortunately, I'll miss this event, but I'm not too upset as I feel that I have more important things to be doing.

I leave you with a few pictures I recently took:

The DREAM Center

Closer view

An inside foyer

Classroom