June 16,2007 PHNOM PENH (UCAN): When the first Catholic missioners were allowed back to Cambodia in the early 1990s, they found the national education system had totally collapsed after two decades of civil war.
Since then, the local Catholic Church has joined with civil society and the government to rebuild the system.
The schools and kindergartens it has set up stress morality and Khmer culture, besides providing basic education, Church officials say.
However, providing broader access to education was a concern from the start, so one of the Church's first steps was to set up "student centers" in towns. These provided accommodations and a sense of community for rural boys and girls who wanted to go on to high school, or eventually university.
The Church now runs 16 such centers in its three territories -- seven in Kompong Cham apostolic prefecture, five in Phnom Penh apostolic vicariate and four in Battambang apostolic prefecture. Only one of the centers, in Phnom Penh, caters to university students. During the past four years, 60 students staying at this center have graduated, and they are now contributing their skills and talents in Cambodian society.
Hin Ran, 26, used to be a student at one of the centers. Among the things he learned was how to love people, serve the poor, live in a community and develop his ideas while respecting others' views, he told UCA News.
Through the student centers, "the Church gives an opportunity to poor students to build their own future," said the young man, who now runs the website of Catholic Social Communications, the Church communications office (www.catholiccambodia.org/en/index.php).
Don Bosco Technical School, the first school the Church set up in the country, opened in 1991 in Phnom Penh. It offers training in mechanics, printing, computer operation, electronics, welding and other vocational fields. About 50 students graduate from the school every year.
The Don Bosco Foundation has also set up education centers for girls and boys in Battambang, Kompot, Phnom Penh, Poipet and Sihanoukville. These centers annually receive 2,000 poor students, who study for free.
In 2004, the Church opened St. Francis of Assisi High School in Takeo province, southern Cambodia. It also runs two primary schools in addition to many kindergartens.
Father Olivier Schmitthaeusler, director of the education committee of Phnom Penh apostolic vicariate, told UCA News: "Education of children and young people is a priority for the Catholic Church in Cambodia. We are trying to improve our education strategies at all levels."
Included in the curriculum of Church-run schools are subjects such as morality, Khmer culture, Khmer civilization, and Khmer traditional dance and music, said the Paris Foreign Missions priest. He explained that helping young Cambodians know and respect their own culture and become good citizens are major goals.
His confrere, Father Francois Ponchaud, sees slow improvement in education in Cambodia, but only in population centers and not in rural areas. He pointed to the large number of young people going to Thailand, South Korea, Malaysia and other countries to look for work. Most of them cannot read and write even in their own Khmer language, Father Ponchaud said, adding that this leaves them easy targets for exploitation by unscrupulous agents and employers.
In recent years, the priest continued, the Church has been supporting construction of schools in rural areas. "We never had any problem with the government ... since it is a direct help to the government," he continued. However, the Church is now questioning whether this is the best way to help, since building schools is the direct responsibility of the Education Ministry, the missioner said.
Civil war in the first half of the 1970s and the brutality of the communist regime led by Pol Pot from 1975 to 1979 killed as many as 2 million Cambodians. Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge tried to wipe out all traces of the Church and to suppress other religions, including Buddhism, now Cambodia's state religion. No Catholic clergy or Religious survived in the country.
Cambodia restored religious freedom in 1991, and missioners began to return.
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