Johanna was recruited to teach by Dimpna, the literacy coordinator. She is 23 and has finished high school. This is her second year as a teacher. Last year she couldn’t finish the entire course because she didn’t have time, but she felt that she had to do it again. Johanna has seven students. Two students dropped out of the class because they had to use their time to work and support their families. She ends up visiting them at their home because they don’t have time to meet at the same time. Some of the ladies would rather stay home because their feet hurt so much at the end of the day. So Johanna ends up teaching them at home.
“Right now I have this student, a lady, who didn’t know how to read. But now she can read a few words, and she gets happy and comes to me and says, ‘Look, this is what this says.’ So now she’s learning to tell the difference between letters. That has made all the difference in her life.”—Johanna Rodríguez