Sonrise School
One of Rwanda’s Top Performing Primary and Secondary Schools
In the aftermath of the genocide, Rwanda’s schools were decimated and the country was overwhelmed with at least 400,000 homeless orphans. In the midst of this devastation, Bishop John Rucyahana founded the Sonrise School to be “light on a hill”. Bishop John’s vision was to create a boarding school that would set the standard for academic excellence and servant leadership development. It is not an orphanage – it admits fee-paying students – but a majority of the school’s students are orphans to demonstrate that every child is redeemable, no matter how needy.
Sonrise School opened in 2001 with 200 students in primary grades 1-4. It has added an additional grade each year since, and today, has over 1100 students in twelve grades (primary 1-6 and secondary 1-6). About half of the students are orphans. Sonrise will graduate its first high school class in November 2010.
Bridge2Rwanda helped build Sonrise High School and team members, Anna Reed, Kelly Simpson and Peyton Greenwald, are currently working at Sonrise – teaching English language and computer skills and preparing the oldest students for the TEOFL exam which is required to attend college in the US.
