In 2006 ActionAid started the Disaster Risk Reduction through schools project. We have been working with people in Bangladesh, Nepal, India, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi and Haiti, which have been affected by disasters such as floods or cyclones.

Schools play a critical role during and after disasters. They often provide a haven for communities and the functioning of a school has a powerful normalising and stabilising effect, both on children and on wider communities.

But few schools are well prepared to play this role. This project helps schools plan for disasters so that they will be safer and able to re-open more quickly after a disaster.

And it builds understanding among teachers of how to identify and deal with distress and trauma caused by disasters and enable schools to make changes to the fabric, to make it physically safer.

One of these teachers, Marahaj Chandra, from Assam in India, talks about the floods and the benefits of the project.

“I have been teaching at this school for 17 years. Every year for the last four years it gets flooded. Before that, there were no floods in school. We close now for two months because of flooding.

The people in this area are like amphibians. We live in the water. We know about floods. But in 2000, 2004 and 2007 we have had terrible floods and we learned that we can’t survive this type of thing. Disease came and many suffered with fever. We didn’t know how to save our lives in those moments. Even our parents and grandparents didn’t know.

I teach about flooding and how to survive in the waters more now. We don’t need books for that. I can save lives by teaching, ‘don’t go to the floodwater without an adult’. I teach swimming and not to eat contaminated food. The children learn first aid.

We are teaching these things in social sciences. We try to know why the floods are more raging now. We are asking, ‘Where do they come from and why are they getting stronger?’

Imrana Begum, student of Karchuyabaki Milan LP School in Hariapar village. All images © Prashant Panjiar/Onasia.com

Yes, I have heard about climate change.

You see the glaciers are cooling down in the mountains and the waters are coming here. The days and nights are so hot now even in the rains. And the rains are torrential. The waters rise immediately.

We are a long way from shelters here and we know to evacuate before it is too late. We teach these things in school. It is too dangerous to get marooned here with no food and water.

We look at the land and see how we can make the floods less devastating. I show these maps to the children and they have very good ideas. They want to plant a few trees between our school and the sutis (river) and beels (lakes). The trees will stop the force of the waters and protect us more so.

Education is very cheap you know, but it’s priceless also.”

To find out more about ActionAid's work on disaster risk reduction, click here