Kayar - CEM (Secondary School - Collège d'enseignement moyen)
Kayar is a traditional fishing town north of the capital Dakar. The Secondary School in Kayar (CEM - Collège d'Enseignement Secondaire) has already collaborated in the early days with our Initiative, first in a joint exhibition with works by pupils from the CEM Kayar and the European School Brussels I in Uccle in the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the European School (May 2008). The exhibition took place under the auspices of the then European Commissioner for Research, Dr. Janez Potočnik. Click here to see it.
The pupils have come a long way since thanks to the teaching of the artist Samba Laye Diop, who kindly took on some lessons and also enabled more learning through visits of particularly interested pupils in the Arts Village in Dakar. You can see the results looking at other productions they were involved with later - the image on the homepage of this website is indeed a group production of pupils of the CEM.
The principal of the CEM, Abibou Diop, was pleased to meet Carla together with one of the pupils ,who had benefited from the extra-art lessons, and explore new ways of collaboration with her and Mundus maris. Click here to see a short video capturing a moment of their meeting (video).
For the size of the fishing village, the school has modest facilities and size - not enough to accommodate all children. The College lacks running water and an internet connection to facilitate access to a wider array of information and networking with other schools in Europe and Africa is still on the 'to-do-list'
The principal summarised the history of Kayar, which is not only known for its traditional fisheries, but has also considerable agriculture potential. Having been founded only in 2006, the school is still very recent. It has six class rooms, a school canteen and a soccer field. Reafforestation is in the beginning and the next achievement will be the completion of toilets. He has 400 pupils.
The canteen associated with the College is a hut on the beach with a straw-mat extension to provide some protection from the intensive sunshine.
To see the short video-sequence on YouTube about the canteen, click here.