Hangop Kabataan
Hangop Kabataan
Fr Michael Sinnott is back in Pagadian City and writes about his work
with children with special needs in that city.
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We started a Centre for Children with Special Needs, called Hangop Kabataan Foundation, in 1998. Hangop means to reach out or embrace and Kabataan means children. Previous to that I had worked in parishes all my life and I often came across children with special needs and nothing was being done for them. I wanted to help them but never had the time. When I finished in the parish I proposed to my superiors and the bishop that we try to start something for these children because at that time nothing was being done for them in the whole province.
We started a survey in the parish of San Jose in the city to find out how many children with special needs were living in the parish. I was an assistant priest there at the time. We found 37 children with special needs. I had only two teachers at the time so I decided we had enough children to begin with. We started off with 37 children but as the programme became known others began to apply and we never refused anybody.
Before we started we called a meeting of all the parents to find out what they wanted us to do for their children. They wanted us to start a school. Any meeting here where people don’t know one another usually starts off with what is called a pagila-ila. Each person stands up and introduces his/her self. It usually takes less than a minute. The first few introduced themselves very briefly, but as the introductions went on each one got longer and longer. They talked about their child and the problems they had to deal with and how they felt helpless to do anything about them. In all it took two and a half hours for this introductory session but when they had finished you could almost feel the sense of relief in the room. This was the first time they had ever been able to share about their problem with an audience that both understood and was sympathetic.
We now have about 60 children who come to the centre every day. We have a vehicle that collects them and delivers them to their homes after class. All those who are capable we prepare for entrance into mainstream education and we’ve got 21 into regular school since we began the programme. We are left with the children who will never benefit much from academic education, but we give them as much as they are capable of. Then we try to make them as independent as possible as regards their own personal needs and bring them to their fullest possible potential. This involves teaching them very basic things like brushing their teeth, cutting their nails, buttoning their shirts and blouses, dressing themselves, hygiene and sometimes even toilet training with the younger ones. We also teach them some simple cooking and housework.
We have five fulltime staff working in the centre with the children: one bookkeeper / secretary, one part- time vocational teacher and a driver cum maintenance man. The vocational teacher works with those who are capable of doing livelihood projects. They make articles for sale and share in the profits. They also cook the snacks for the children every day. We have the usual kinds of special needs children in the programme – the autistic, the deaf, those with impaired hearing, the slow learners, those with cerebral palsy, the physically handicapped and the mentally slow.
Apart from those who come to the centre there are sixteen other children who are confined to their homes because of the severity of their disabilities. The staff visit these children once a week for tutorials, or therapy, or both, according to their needs. They also teach the parents and family members how best to help their children. Before we started, the children were more or less hidden away in their homes because their parents did not know how to help them or how to do anything for them. Some were over-compensating by doing for them what they could be taught to do themselves. They felt a sense of relief and hope on realising that something could be done for their children, and that they might also be able to help them become independent, at least as regards their personal needs. Every year, during the long summer break, we run a seminar in Sign Language.
In the programme itself you need infinite patience. With some of the real slow learners, it is an accomplishment to get them to count from one to five in a semester. I’ve been very lucky to have a very committed and dedicated staff. I tell them that this is a vocation not a job. Some of these children are very withdrawn and silent when they first come to us and it is great to see them blossoming out to be laughing and spontaneous children who will run up to you and hug you when you come into the room. There is a great sense of community among the children. The older ones happily help out the youngsters. All this has given me a great sense of satisfaction, especially when I see the deaf becoming literate in sign language. We have a deaf club which meets once a month and this includes deaf persons outside of our school programme. They meet to socialize but also receive some inputs that might help them with their own personal lives. They are delighted to come together to share with each other.
Last year, when I was kidnapped, all these children and the staff members of the centre stormed heaven with their prayers for my release. Certainly, being free again was like a Resurrection experience for me. The children gave me the warmest of welcomes when I returned here to Pagadian. While on holidays in Ireland, many generous people heard of the Hangop Kabataan Foundation and sent me generous donations to support and expand the programme. I am indebted to all of them for their kindness.
I hope to have a few more years to continue my work for children with special needs. All lives have a certain amount of risk; we take normal common sense precautions but we can’t let threats stop us from doing what we are doing.
Fr Michael Sinnott was kidnapped in Pagadian City on October 11th last and held for thirty-one days before being released
[Far East Magazine]