She’ll probably be writing in her notebook and listening to her teacher give a lecture. For a good part of the class, she’ll be repeating back to her teacher in unison with her classmates, whatever it is the teacher has just said.
There are over 780 students at her school and not everyone attends on the same schedule. The school is building two new classrooms and also has tent rooms set up on the school grounds to accommodate everyone. While she is 17-years old, her classmates are as young as 11 and as old as 22. The school system is more fluid in this regard than in America, because here people miss school for years at a time due to life circumstances that prevent them from attending. They can come back, but they have to start at whatever level they left. One of the girls living in our house, Koumba, is 21 and attends high school. She has a two-year old and is a single mom, but thanks to generous relatives and and encouraging family, she will finish her high-school education. This is extremely rare for teen mothers here.
After class, Ansetta will hang out with her friends outside the classrooms and take snapchat videos or gossip about boys and who likes who. They’ll maybe wander the local vendor street and window-shop for cell-phone cases or fabric for new clothes that they can’t afford right now. Her parents send her some money via the Orange app each month (like Venmo) so she can have some spending money. Like most families, money is tight in hers, so she will not be buying anything unless it’s necessary for her education or unless she’s saved up her allowance.
