Haiti · Brighten Haiti · December 2025
In their own words: students in Dumas, Haiti, on solar power
26 students at Institution Sainte Bernadette Soubirous de Dumas, a school in Dumas, Haiti served by Brighten Haiti, wrote essays in November and December 2025 about school before and after solar power. They were written for a Brighten Haiti essay contest and are shown here in English translation.
The essays begin where the school day begins, in the classroom. Before the solar system, students wrote, a cloudy morning could dim the room past the point of reading, and on hot days there was no electricity for fans. Then the power arrived, and the description shortens to a sentence: the light works.
What stands out is how ordinary the wish is. None of the students wrote about wanting something extra. They wrote about wanting what other schools already have: working light, fans that turn on, phones that charge. The details stay small, a page read without squinting, a breeze that does not come from a notebook, homework finished after dark.
Flash Forward's study lights are built for students like these, for the hours after the school day ends. Each costs $5.17 in parts and is assembled by student interns in Bellevue, Washington. A light charges in the sun during the day and gives a student up to 12 hours of light at night, past the early sunset. The 42 lights delivered through Brighten Haiti extend what these essays describe from the classroom to the home.
“The solar system is not just light, it's our hope for the future in Dumas.”Tamisade, NS2, Dumas, Haiti
“I used to hear other kids talk about how beautiful and bright their schools were.”Mitchcaila, 7th grade, Dumas, Haiti
“When it was hot, we had no electricity for the fans, so we had to make wind with notebook pages or hand fans.”Saintina, 8th grade, Dumas, Haiti
“A place without electricity is like a machine without an engine.”Milanda, 6th grade, Dumas, Haiti
“It's a complete change: we work better and more easily.”Hudson, 9th grade, Dumas, Haiti
“The classroom was dark, and when it got cloudy, we couldn't see well.”Djinaieka, 7th grade, Dumas, Haiti
Essays by students at Institution Sainte Bernadette Soubirous de Dumas, written for a Brighten Haiti essay contest (English translation).
Read together, the essays say what the light is for. They also say what the writers want to become. “When I finish school, I would like to become a great doctor so I can help sick people get care and contribute to improving the health of the community,” wrote Tamisade, in NS2. Milanda, a 6th grader, has a plan too: “I would like to become a technician or an engineer to help more people use solar energy, especially in rural areas.”
The essays describe the same change Brighten Haiti brings to schools: dependable light and power where there was none. Flash Forward's 42 study lights for Brighten Haiti extend that change past the schoolyard, so a student can study at home after dark.
