Education in Rural Laos
Children attending school in Laos
Photo: Skip Dangers/CWS
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Boo (center) is 10. She is from the Akha minority group and lives in a mountaintop village in Oudomxay province in northern Laos. Her parents are subsistence farmers, practicing swidden (shifting) cultivation: Because of the poor soil and lack of fertilizers, the planting area must be changed every year. Boo's family of 8 has a cash income of less than five dollars per month. Here Boo is attending the first grade in her village's very first school, a school built by the people of her village, with help from Church World Service and the local Education Department. The people in Boo's village are very curious and enthusiastic about what is being taught in the school. There is often a crowd of adults peeking in with encouragement.