Meet Christopher Bwayo, a well-loved businessman in Butiiru trading center. Christopher's shop, shop which sells general merchandise, is the closest thing to a supermarket in his village. Yet 42 year-old Christopher does not know how to write his own name. Keeping even the most basic business records is simply not possible. Christopher is ambitious and has always worked hard at his businesses, even as he has struggled to get ahead.
Illiteracy has forced this budding businessman to entrust his monies in the hands of different people, often with disastrous consequences. “I have employed 8 people to help me handle my business account records over the years, but one by one they have run off with my money.” He had plans to close the business and seek lessons . But now he sees hope with DCI’s literacy class. He is very anxious to start learning and applying his lessons right away with our practical approach as he continues with his business.
DCI’s Arithmetic Curriculum
It’s hard to imagine that many people don’t understand numbers and basic arithmetic, but this is also a big part of illiteracy. The inability to work with numbers and math results in poor planning, poor business outcomes, unfair cheating, and confusion in managing farming inputs, and even medical treatment.
Our arithmetic curriculum includes arithmetic from adding and subtracting, multiplying and dividing, all the way through fractions and percentages. These are all essential for economic development. The material is introduced with practical exercises relating to students’ real lives, and then on into the business they develop as a class. And for people like Christopher, who are instinctively drawn to business, our lessons provide immediate practical solutions.
Christopher Bwayo is one of the lucky ones. He has been able to enroll in a fully funded DCI literacy class, and should be seeing dramatic changes within a few months. But right now, hundreds of others are waiting for such an opportunity.
