Haiti Earthquake Refugees Thriving in Miami Schools

In the aftermath of the earthquake's devastation, Miami-Dade Schools braced for a wave of refugee students from Haiti. More than a thousand enrolled in the public schools, but these weren't the destitute kids school officials were expecting.

In fact, they are mostly the children of families with enough money and means to send them to Miami, children who went to the best schools in their homeland. 

"The classes were harder in Haiti," says Priscila Chalmers, a senior at Felix Varela High School in Kendall. Her opinion is roundly shared by the seven other "earthquake kids" NBC Miami spoke with at the school, which took in 51 earthquake refugees last year.

"They're good students, they're used to rigorous work, " says Varela High's principal, Connie Navarro. "They complain about not having enough homework!"

A year later, the Haitian kids blend right into the school's student body, but unlike their peers, they have a shared experience that bonds them forever.

"I thought I was gonna die that day," said Kevin Lassegue.

"I lost my father," Carl Pierre-Louis told us.

"I think about it all the time, it's like, everyday," said Zahry Edmond.

All the students tell riveting stories about how the earthquake effected them, their families, and their lives today.

"I don't think there's a day since the earthquake that I didn't think about it," says Hillel Rousseau. "I have images that are stuck in my head that nothing could remove."

In general, the earthquake kids at Varela are doing well in school, despite being haunted by memories that seem like yesterday.

"Everytime I think about it, I think of this guy who was sitting down and he was holding another person's hand but the person was dead," Chalmers said.

"Everywhere I go, there's a dead body, everywhere," Edmond remembers. "Some images in my head just won't leave."

Tatyana Lassegue was caught downtown during the quake with her older brother, Kevin.

"We spent five hours walking and see everyone crying and people were dying," Tatyana said. "Mothers that lost their kids, kids that were lost."

When the kids tell you these stories, you can see the pain in their eyes, even though none of them admit to being traumatized. Considering what they've experienced, and the fact that all of the students we spoke to left at least one, if not both parents back in Haiti, their success at adjusting to life here is remarkable. Several of them used sports to ease their transition.

"When I'm on the tennis court I lose myself in the game, and I forget about everything else," Rousseau says. He and Zahry Edmond have elevated Varela's tennis team to new heights. 

Pierre-Louis is a big guy, so he immediately gravitated to football, which wasn't an option in Haiti. 

"I came here and everybody's reaching out to me, I'm getting help from everybody, especially my coach," Pierre-Louis said.

His road has been harder than the others. Not only did Pierre-Louis lose his dad in the quake, but his brother was murdered a couple of months ago on a visit back to Haiti. That's a heavy weight for an 11th grader to bear, especially one who's dealing with those emotions without family to comfort him. His mom is still in Haiti.

Carl-Frederick Janvier's parents are still in Haiti, too. They're both doctors, and they stayed behind to treat earthquake victims while they sent their son to live with his aunt in Miami.

All the earthquake kids at Varela uniformly say they're glad to be in the United States, happy to be at their new school. They also say, without hesitation, that they miss their old lives in Haiti.

12th grader Edmond speaks for many when he says he wants to go back to help his country one day. But first, there's work to do: high school graduation, college, and maybe a rebuilt Haiti in their future.

"Hopefully," Edmond says, "the country will rise again."

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