June 29, 2016 
– The day after the 6-hour hike was considered a “chill day”, because we had to let our bodies recover from the hike. So we got up, ate breakfast and went to the Maxfield Park Children’s Home. When we arrived, there were not a large amount of kids visible, many of them were still in school, and the few that were around didn’t talk much. I could tell that they were nervous. Most of them just stared at us. It was kind of uncomfortable because presumptuously I thought they were judging me, but then I realized that they have seen a lot of groups come through, and they really just wanted to get a feel for us, and whether we were there just to be spectators or if we were there to help them.
We met the Director of Programs, Mr. Lawrence, who gave us an introduction of the program, facility and its history. The children’s home provides shelter and development for homeless youth. The children may have come to the home for various reasons including: their parents aren’t in a financial place to support them, the parents abandoned the child, or they’ve experienced abuse or neglect. This made me realize how fortunate I am to have parents to take care of me and love me through everything. It also made me realize that I am able to trust them with my future because the children at Maxfield Park don’t have that. Because the children live in this shelter they don’t have as much individualized support and unfortunately, they are often really on their own to ensure that they make the best decisions for their life overall.
After we left the children’s home we went to two museums, the first was The Institute of Jamaica. There I learned about the history of Jamaica in two parts – the first part focused on revolutions that shaped Jamaica and the second part discussed the culture of the Rastarfari and its impact on Jamaica. Throughout the streets of Jamaica, you can see different aspects of their culture through wall art, etc and it was really interesting to learn about the history more in depth. The second museum was the Bank of Jamaica, in there we received a tour of the bank and learned about the history of and the diverse forms of money and how money has been used over time to to purchase items. We were also able to see the different Jamaican currencies in their authentic form and the various “heroes and heroines of Jamaica” that we had learned about at the Institute were the faces on the money. This was extremely significant because we’ve seen these faces throughout our travels and everyone knows the history of these individuals.
Jadaica G., E L Haynes Public Charter School