In 6th Grade Social Studies, we are learning about the human rights listed in the United Nations (UN’s) Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). Human rights are agreements put into a list that everyone should uphold so that everyone can live an adequate life; this list was created after World War 2.
Article 25 of the UDHR states that everyone should have an adequate life, including food, clothing, clean water, housing, and medical care.
To help us understand what a person’s life is like when they lack basic human rights, we had the opportunity to hear from someone who did not have the human rights they needed to have an adequate standard of living. Marie Claire Kaberamanzi and her family did not have all of their human rights met.
Marie Claire came to BCS to talk about her experience with 6th, 10th, and 12th grade Social Studies classes. Marie Claire was a refugee when she was young.
Marie Claire was born while her family was on the run. As refugees, they were forced to leave their home country, The Congo, because of war. Their lives were in danger because the war was happening and it was not safe for them to stay there.
They left Congo and walked from Zambia for 4 years. The distance from The Congo to Zambia is about the same distance from New York to Florida
In Zambia, although they were not in danger from war, their family was not always safe. When Marie Claire was 12, a group of men came into her family’s house to rob them. They beat her dad, then turned to her mom. They beat her until she was no longer alive. Marie Claire and her siblings watched this happen and were unable to do anything. Although this was very difficult, Marie Claire was determined to get an education because it was very important to her mom.
When her mom was alive, she filed for refugee status for her family. Many years after her mom’s death, the family’s refugee status was granted. She and her family moved to Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 2015. A few years later she met Malala Yousafzai at a refugee gathering in Lancaster, which is called the “Refugee Capital of the World”. Malala was inspired by Marie Claire’s story. She included her story in her book We Are Displaced– which tells the stories of refugee girls from around the world.
We thought Marie Claire’s visit was very inspiring because she and her family survived so much trauma. What stuck out to us the most was her persistence, because watching her mom die so tragically and brutally. Many people might not have been able to accomplish so much and work so hard to get an education to become a nurse. Not only that, she has bravely shared her story with so many people. We feel so grateful that we had the opportunity to hear her story in person.
For our Social Studies ET this semester, we will visit the United Nations to learn more about human rights and what the UN is doing to ensure that people all over the world get the human rights they deserve. After hearing Marie Claire’s story we understand why it is so important to know and to have human rights.
