NPR

Seeds Of Maya Genius Grow In A New Kind Of School

It's in Guatemala, where the educational achievement of poor students is severely lacking. Students might dress up in cow costumes, bake bread — or frame a building.
Teenagers play chess during a break at the main Los Patojos campus.

Imagine a small, developing nation whose education system is severely lacking: schools are poorly funded, students can't afford tuition or books, fewer than half of indigenous girls even attend school — and often drop out to take care of siblings or get married.

These are the schools of rural Guatemala.

Now meet a firebrand educator who thinks he has a way to reinvent schools in Guatemala.

His school is called Los Patojos, a Spanish word used in Guatemala that means "little ones."

The main school building — with its sunny courtyard and

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