The Day Program for boys currently living on the streets continues on Sunday mornings. Art and Taekwondo have been added to the program. The last Sunday in March, a program was held and all the family members were invited. Report cards were announced and rewarded. 36 boys, in addition to the Peace House residents, are enrolled in school. Several were first in their class. The director of Street Children Affairs was present and made a speech to the boys and their family members. After the program, all 12 boys at Peace House went to stay with their families during the school break as a first step in the re-integration process.

In addition to the community develpment Lori Kimbrow and Dr. Robinson finalized their plans with the director of Nyamata Hopital to begin providing education and patient care in the district of Bugesera. Our goal in the Month of March is to begin traveling to Nyamata, Juru and Mayange to provide the agreed services.

We were able to continue with the Taekwondo Peace Corps program volunteers from Korea and the World Taekwondo Federation. They worked tirelessly in Kigali and Musanze through this month teaching masters better techniques, teaching the street boy program at the ATN office, teaching in the Taekwondo clubs of Gatenga-Dream Club and INILAC – Horang Club as well as performing demonstrations at local schools.

In addition to this we held a closing ceremony at the Ecole Belge for the TPC which included not only players from Rwanda but also Burundi and DRC. Apart from this we prepared national junior player Tucker Koonce for competition in the German Open in March and the World Junior Championships in April which will be held in Egypt. Also, we continued to produce uniforms and targets for supplying the needs of players in Rwanda. Other equipment we received from the World Taekwondo Federation and Taekwondo Peace Corps was sparring equipment for nine players and totaled $1500 in value.

Heath also met with the headmaster at the Gahanga Primary school to begin conversations in teaching their English teachers these materials.

Jessica Sorenson also arrived on the ground with plans to pick up where the Garners left off in their work with ATN.

Both Dr. Robinson and Lori Kimbrow have continue to provide patient care on a need by need basis for those in our community.

The boys at Peace House are raising rabbits as an income generating project, but also to teach them the responsibility of working and taking care of things. They started with seven rabbits and there are already 40. The boys gather food for the rabbits each day and clean their cages.

In 2010, three ATN Volunteers attended Literacy International’s Literacy Institute in Tulsa, OK. They were trained how to use LI’s Firm Foundation Literacy materials to teach others how to read and write their heart language. These materials, developed in dozens of languages, all use the same method and technique. Thus, once a teacher learns the method, he or she can use the materials in any language. These three ATN volunteers returned to Rwanda and trained other ATN volunteers and staff to use these materials.

In the summer of 2011, Christine Crowson, began a pilot Kinyarwanda Literacy class with vulnerable women in Kicukiro using LI’s Kinyarwanda Literacy materials. The class began with one and quickly grew to four. Christine was then able to model and train a Rwandan woman how to use the materials to teach others. Now, she is doing the lessons and Christine is in a mentor/advisor role.

The joy on someone’s face when they learn to read is indescribable. Our hope is that all Rwandans will be able to receive this gift: reading and writing in their heart language of Kinyarwanda.

First was a single lever that produced about 200 psi of pressure. It only cost about 2000 rwf to build. It didn’t provide as much pressure as needed but was easy to build, durable, light weight, and inexpensive. The second model used a double lever design, costs around 5000 rwf to build and generates about 400 psi of pressure. this press was less durable, uses hardware, is more expensive, and is harder to build, but it generated almost double the pressure of the single lever. This second model was used in production as a test and generated on average one small briquette per minute. While trying to produce additional briquettes at maximum pressure this press split in one of the lever arms. Because of this we saw the need to make another model of press. We used the same design but used wood that was double the thickness of the previous double lever press. The estimated cost of this press is 10,000 francs. It is more durable than the other designs and produced the best briquettes because of the greater pressure (an estimated three times the single lever design).

Additionally we looked at briquette design after having experimented with a pyrolyzed type made from tree branches as well as a non-pyrolyzed type made from sawdust and paper. We settled on the sawdust and paper model as it was more environmentally friendly and during this month have run burn tests on four different models.

Lastly, two trips were made to Musanze to meet with others making briquettes, Art of Conservation, and the Mountain Gorilla Veterinary Project. On the second visit the press was tested and briquettes were made cooperatively. ATN promised to participate with them through future visits and a commitment to share learning and technology.