Activity report 2010

-          Blog of the association in French and English http://ecolenomadeevenk.over-blog.com (responsibility of the website: V. Coeffet, responsibility of the translation: H. Lecomte)

-          Presentation of the film “The Nomadic School” (responsibility: H. Lecomte, M. Debats) in several festivals, as well as in the Sorbonne University, in France. The film was presented as well in festivals in Canada, China, United States, Peru and Russia.

-          Sending at least twice a year of an activity report to the members of the association (responsibility of Alexandra Lavrillier)

-          Relations with the Press (France, Russia, Europe) (responsibility of Alexandra Lavrillier and Henri Lecomte)

Board reunions and activity reports:

Activity report November 2010-December 2010

-          Keeping track of the good functioning of the nomadic school through satellite phone call and email with the director of the village school, the teachers and the guide. The first season was all right and the results were good. Preparation of the second season with the teachers and the director of the village school. /AL

-          Translation from English to French and publication in the Survival International France magazine of the open letter of the RAIPON (Russian Association of the Indigenous Peoples of the North) to the President of the Russian Federation, about the situation of the Siberian peoples. /HL

-          Study of bank accounts and sale of the last elk skin bags. /CC

-          Balance of accounts on 12/31/2010 : account in euros, 1749, 37, - account in USD, 12606, 35

-          Balance of accounts on 01/31/20112010 : account in euros, 1779, 37, - account in USD, unchanged

-          Encounter with Press : Russian television Russia today – R. Safronov, BBC United Kingdom/ AL & HL

Report of the meeting of November 12 2010

Members: Colette Chausson, Alexandra Lavrillier, Henri Lecomte, Sophie Veziant

New version of the file for asking financial support for the school and identification of the organizations we can apply to. Setting of a working plan: 1 – Organizations (like Rolex, EDF, BNP and so on); 2 – Private enterprises in Russia (Société générale, Michelin … and those that would have a marketing interest: warm clothes, computer equipment, solar energy, to which we would be able to sell photos for publicity); 3 – Official organizations: UNESCO, UNICEF (we got in touch at that time at several occasions with these peoples without any result). We studied websites: EDF, Total, BNP, Suez foundations; 4 – The Governor of the Amur region (whom AL tried to meet during this autumn); 5 - Paid conferences -500-600 euros for one conference) in several clubs (Lyons, Rotary, retired persons, enterprise committees). About twenty conferences would be enough to finance the school for one year. S. Veziant proposes to make a first file for Gaz de France. H. Lecomte asked the RAIPON (Russian association of the Indigenous Peoples of the North, in Moscow) directly to one of its director, R. Suljandziga, to make him a list of potentially interested organizations, without any success.

Activity report June 2010 – October 2010

AL was in Siberia for a research mission stayed twice (June and September) at the village linked with the nomadic school. AL could:

-          Reorganize during a general meeting on the 20^th of September with the director of the village school Mr Breev as well as with all the concerned parents, the functioning of the nomadic school for the next year (presentation of a new teacher, repartition of the qualified teachers and of the nomadic educators in the five concerned encampments during the three seasons of the year, repartition of the equipment, recalling of the work rules, balance sheet of the sponsoring, distribution of funds to buy school impediment and food products, and so on). The first school season went on reindeer back to the encampments at the end of September. The preparatory classes are again authorized to continue their school attendance at the nomadic school.

-          Recruit a new teacher from a neighbouring village, T. D. Goncharova, an Evenk scholar with a high level who has studied at the University of Saint Petersburg and who taught in the best schools of the Siberian East and worked with several linguists. She started to teach in one of the encampment between September ad December with success.

-          Train the new teacher to the functioning of the nomadic school, to the realization of computer handbooks of Evenk language and culture, and to the handling of several apparatus. The new teacher was accompanied by her five years old son, who became a new pupil of the nomadic nursery school.

-          P. Vassilev, the guide of the nomadic school; equipped the new teacher (clothes and equipment to travel on reindeer back) and took care of guiding her on reindeer back to the encampments and to the village for vacations.

-          Try to get in touch with the Governor of the Amur Region, Mr Kozhemjako. A file to ask for a financial aid to the school was constituted with the help of Evenki specialists of the Ministry of Traditional Economics of the Amur Region. This file was then transmitted to the Ministry of Education of this region and integrated in the budget request 2011-2014 of the Amur Region.

-          To make sensitive the new director of the Education department (Mr Plotnikov) in the Tynda region, of which depends the nomadic school. The last director, Mrs Klimovich, a great ally of the nomadic school, went to retirement in Ukraine.

-          To organize the travel then the medical observation at the Tynda hospital of one of the pupils of the nomadic school who had serious health problems, the cost of which his parents were unable to pay for.

-          To make the pedagogical evaluation with the director of the village school and the graduate teachers and educators of the 2009-2010 nomadic school: the school level is as a whole superior to the one of the pupils of the village school, and this in every topic. Moreover, the pupils of the nomadic school have an excellent knowledge of the Evenk language and traditions and have a very well balanced mind.

Report of the meeting of the May 31 2010

Members: Colette Chausson, Alexandra Lavrillier, Henri Lecomte

After the consultation of the accounts sent from the school of Oust’-Niukja, we could see for the school year 2009-2010 a cost of 413420 roubles, the equivalent of  11165 euros, for twelve wage earners and twenty-five children of scholar and pre scholar children living in six encampments.

We just sent two orders of transfer that should allow the school to go on for next school year. We will have then six months of financing.

We invite all of the members to tell us any idea that would allow us to collect new funds. An information letter about the activities of the association is sent to every member.

Activity report March 2010-May 2010

The mayor of the village and the Director of the school inform us that their efforts to find in the region a financial support wee a failure, in spite of their moral support. The Amur region is going through a serious crisis and knows many dismissals. Without any foreign sponsor, the school seems so to have no future. The new director of the school, who seems very motivated and energetic, intends to propose a financing project at a federal level, but the result is quite uncertain. AL will go to the village in June. Together with the director, she will write the activity reports, in relation with the status of Experimental school of the Amur region. If the report is well evaluated by the local authorities, it is possible that this type of school will receive some support in the whole region. During the three examination sessions, the level of the nomadic children has been quite satisfying, which certainly brought a better understanding from the local authorities.

We had the bad news of a recent land law that orders the nomadic peoples to pay a yearly tax on their traditional pasture lands. Moreover, the Nioukja river, from where comes the drinking water of a good part of the region is very polluted and becomes unfit for consumption. The mayor of the village looks for a financial support to cope with this catastrophic situation.

We are going as well to lose the support of the French community in Moscow, our friends being sent to other countries.  They will have anyway the time to send a last mailing of clothes and of 4500 roubles. The association sold about ten elk skin bags that were hand made by the mothers in the encampments.

Activity report December 2009-February 2010

The nomadic school has been reorganized for a better autonomy during AL’s stay. A new call for funds has been made.

The remaining funds of the 2006 Rolex Prize will allow the school to work one year more (as a whole, the yearly cost of the school is between 12000 and 15000 euros).  We are involved in an intensive search for funds.

The local authorities will probably not bring any supplementary support or a very little one, because it is the poorest region of Siberia and because the Evenks are not in this region at the first rank of the interests of the local Government, even if we have the support of the regional direction of the Education Department.

Bringing an higher teaching to the parents

            Aside from the payment of the salaries of the teachers, of the implements and of the electronic apparatus, the funds are used as well to pay the education of women who want it, in the University of the local Capital. In return, they will perform three years of teaching in the nomadic school. Presently, two of them, wives of reindeer breeders who have until now worked as assistant-teachers, may realize their studies through mail. One of them had begun last year and is now in her second year. Both of them share their time between their work of teacher and their travels in the towns of the region for their teaching activities and their administration work for the family cooperative.  They try to find solutions to keep their pastures, in spite of the new law, and so to avoid the influence of the local traders who bought a part of the rights on the land. Without a doubt, the nomadic school, aside from creating works and the fact of being favourable for the development of children, has a stimulating role.

            AL taught one of the village young peoples how to work on internet. She will participate to a formation seminary in Moscow and Geneva.

New  recruiting

New parents have been recruited as educators to work in the nomadic school.

A school organized according to traditional social rules

The school is reorganised according to the local traditional organisation. So as to optimize and making more autonomous the nomadic school, AL recruited Galina Ivanovna, an Evenk woman locally involved with high authority. Prepared to the specificities of the school, she constituted with AL articles and conditions with necessary information for 2009-2010.

Diverse succeeds

            For reasons of administrative establishment of the village school, the director asked the pupils of the infants’ class to stay at least the first half-year at the village school. It is as well a way for them to discover what is a sedentary school. One can see that, like last year, the children of the nomadic school are better prepared for the infants’ class than those who are staying in the village. Let’s remark as well that the children have a perfect command of Evenk language.

            The image of the nomadic school is changing among the teachers of the village school. The daughter of Svetlana, Vera (who can be seen in the film “The Nomadic School”), who had followed the school preparation given by her mother, entered in last September in the infants’ class and is the best in her class. Her actual teacher, a Russian woman, is all the time praising her and congratulates her mother for her work. Vera thinks that the school is easy and does not understand why the other children do not know the answers. She is always raising her finger to answer. Her sister Nastia, who is five years old, already knows how to read. Svetlana Vassileva, comforted by these successes, decided to start studying teaching for the infants’ class (from October 2009) and to open a family cooperative. It is essential and new that a nomadic child is perceived with such a positive image by the village teachers. It is very important for the future development of the child that he may feel as performing and without a feeling of inferiority.

            Another success, the little Andrej Isakov (9 years old, present as well in the film “The Nomadic School”) is now a master of intensive reading and of crossword puzzles, aside from being a perfect speaker of Evenk. After having read all the school handbooks from A to Z, he has, as it seems, read all the books of Evenk and Russian literature that are in the elevated  storehouses in the taiga, including scientific works about the ethnography of the Evenks that AL had left to his parents, some years ago. The parents of Andrej are worrying that he should lose his taste for instruction when he will be compelled in one year to join the village school (attracted by TV and video games). Already, in infants’ class he was the faster reader of his class. Andrej who his very near to his parents, will maybe be able to postpone for a year his entrance in the boarding house.

Change of the director of the village school

            The ex-director of the village school, Mr Melnikov, has become the mayor of the said village and the school is now directed by a young Russian man, Mr Breev, who supports the nomadic school. He promised to look for funds at the level of the local council, to support the nomadic school. He openly recognised its utility in a recent program on television about the education system in the Amur region.

Médecins du Monde

            We were invited in October by Armelle Laperre, to the first congress of a new Russian NGO created at the initiative of Médecins du Monde, to educate health assistants among the nomadic populations of Siberia; an education already begun by MDM at the village in March 2009. Unhappily, neither the local coordinator of the nomadic school (because of the ice blockage of the rivers that forbids the access to the village), nor AL (suffering from pneumonia) could go there. Yet, we shall be informed of the developments and the actions of this NGO with which we should collaborate.

Diverse valorisations

            The film about the nomadic school (La Gaptière, http://www.lagaptiere.com) still has a lot of success, with many prizes, the last positive news being that it has been bought by the RAI, the Italian national channel. The production, that had been very generous as well with the nomadic school as with the Nomads (who have all been paid), has not yet paid off its shooting investments.           

            An exhibition presenting great panels on the ski tracks of Serre Chevallier has been organised by Isabelle de Beaufort (with La Gaptière photographs, presenting the school).

Associative functioning

            HL obtained an appointment with the Chirac foundation (that, unfortunately, cannot help us), on the 8 of February. We met as well Isabelle de Beaufort on the 11 of February, who could not do anything.

            Véronique Coeffet takes care of the blog of the association

http://ecolenomadeevenk.over-blog.com

            All the year long, Colette Chausson has taken care of the financial aspect of the association.

Diverse actions on the field

Start of the four sections of the nomadic school for a new season.

            Arrival of the nomadic groups at the village, control of the school level of the children, new distribution of computing and electrical apparatus. The computers and the electrical motors travel from one group to the other, from one season to the other.

Gathering of the photo funds gathered from all the sections of the nomadic school.

Meeting of the journalists of Ilken, the magazine of the Minority Peoples of the North of Yakutia (an article about the school should be issued);

Meeting of the peoples in charge with the Nomadic Schools of the Sakha Republic (House or the Peoples of the North). This department, led by an Even, is in charge with the nomadic schools (many of which being fictitious) that the Republic has “opened” with the help of the UNESCO. Some of them work and get a real support from the Republic (salary and formation of the nomadic teachers, even if there is only one pupil, regular publications, satellite radio and telephone, production of specialized handbooks, and so on…). We have been proposed to invite one of the teachers of the nomadic school of the Amur region to study in the section for nomadic schools of the Ministry of the Pedagogical University of Yakutia;

The supporting team of Moscow (especially Patricia Godin) sent around twenty parcels of clothes that have been shared, under the wing of elder ladies, the pillars of the society, in an equitable way between the nomadic families and the families with a low income of the village. The recipients wanted to tell their gratefulness to the Moscow team. For reasons of respect of the families, no photo was taken during the reception and the sharing of the parcels.

A gift of documentary archives about the peoples of Siberia has been made (all the rushes of the La Gaptière film, the collection of AL about Siberian cultures and local history) to the village library.

The number of technical apparatus has been reorganised. The computers were completely reformed, new programs installed and distributed to families who had no access to them before. Training lessons have been offered to these families.

A help has been brought for creating a family cooperative (redaction of texts and administrative documents).

The staff of the Association franco-évenke Sekalan (loi 1901)

Alexandra Lavrillier – President

Colette Chausson – Treasurer

Henri Lecomte - Secretary