Our Schools

Les Bons Samaritains | Our Secondary School | The Cardinal William H. Keeler Trade Center | Literacy School

Les Bons Samaritains (The Good Samaritans School)

The school's mission is to educate and feed the poorest of the poor of the region. Les Bons Samaritains is the school built by The Mortel Family Charitable Foundation with a grant of nearly $500,000 from Food for the Poor. The school is Dr. Rodrigue Mortel’s memorial to his mother, the person who was an example in life that prayer, determination and hard work yield great power. The construction of this school is Dr. Mortel’s life long dream realized with the help of many.

Opened in 2001, the elementary school educates over 600 children from Kindergarten through Grade 9. The students are chosen from the poorest neighborhoods in St. Marc. They receive top notch education, including technology and science. The school is directed by the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph de Cluny. Tuition, books, food and basic medical care are provided free to the students. The goal of the Good Samaritan School is to form a new generation of Haitians who are well-equipped to become future leaders of the country.

Our Secondary School (James Stine College)

The James Stine College is being built in St. Marc. It will welcome its first students in September 2011. It will offer quality secondary education to young women and men from the area that would otherwise have had to travel to Port-au-Prince to complete high school. The project is sponsored jointly by the Archdiocese of Baltimore and the Mortel Family Charitable Foundation.

Background and Rationale
According to a UN report, in Haiti only 50 percent of the children attend elementary schools and 20% of those proceed to secondary education. For Haitian children living in abject poverty, access to any school is extremely limited.

A large number of children enrolled in parochial schools of the Gonaives Diocese have received a solid elementary education and the number is growing. However, while in the northern part of the Diocese these children have access to a quality secondary education, the situation is very different in the southern region of the Diocese where the large city of St. Marc and a large number of small towns are located.

Current student performance on national examinations proves the quality of secondary education in the southern Diocese’s few existing schools is mediocre at best. In order to receive a fairly well balanced secondary education, students of the region who are economically capable have to be separated from their parents to attend school in Port-au-Prince where finding a host family is extremely difficult and costs for tuition, room and board are quite high. Those who cannot afford these costs drop out all together. Therefore there is a need to have a school where the poor and intellectually capable students can receive a high quality education following completion of their elementary schooling.

The Cardinal William H. Keeler Trade Center

Since only 5-10 percent of Haitians have the financial resources to pursue a traditional graduate education, the remaining 90-95 percent need an alternative, perhaps a trade. Therefore, a trade school was built for adolescent vocational skills.

This school, named the Cardinal Keeler Center, provides Haitians the opportunity to acquire technical skills in various trades including plumbing, electricity, carpentry, auto mechanic, masonry, craftsmanship, and so on. Trades that are attractive to women, such as sewing, will also be taught.

The school is located in Gonaives, Haiti, about 25 miles from St. Marc, where Les Bons Samaritains (The Good Samaritans School) is operating. The inaugural class, entered the school in September of 2007, consisting of adolescents from both the Gonaives and St. Marc regions. The school is directed by the Salesian priests, who have a strong reputation in the country for their background in creating a resourceful technical school curriculum.

Literacy School

Adult Literacy classes for men and women are provided Monday through Friday over a three year cycle at the Good Samaritan School building located in St. Marc.