Education among the Surui People
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A limited access to school Concerning education, the Surui villages have several elementary schools (there isn't one per village, but all the children have access to a rather close school). There are both Surui and white teachers, employed by the Secretariat in the Education (SEDUC) of Rondônia. Some Surui professors also give courses of alphabetisation and rudimentary mathematics for adults. The Surui give a high importance to education, and a few of tem have started higher studies. They are comparatively succeeding very well: recently four of them successfully passed their "vestibular ", the entrance exam for the faculty of Port Velho, and are the first Indians in Rondônia to have reached such a level of study. However the problem is that this investment in the education was detrimental to the education in traditional knowledge that Suruí wish to protect, since the students have to go away for long periods of time. The Suruí indeed underwent the preaching of American evangelic missionaries who inhibited a big part of the traditional culture, forbidding ceremonies and rituals. Today about half of the population says itself "believer" (often more a question of politics than faith), but the traditional ceremonies are starting over again shyly, the missionaries not residing any more in the villages. The association Aquaverde actively supports the Surui people in finding ways to provide a better access to higher education to their young. |
| An educated youth to unite tradition and modernity. |
| Aquaverde is a swiss non profit association recognized of public utiliy by the "République et Canton de Genève" (Geneva Canton and federal State). Your donations over CHF 200.-- yearly are tax deductible in Switzerland. © Aquaverde 2011 |
