Haiti's girls celebrate as they return to school

She is an average 13-year-old – sassy with her teachers, giggly with her school-mates. She and the other girls are like any other 13-year-olds at recess – skipping rope, ribbons flying in their hair, arms draped over each other's shoulders, and giggling with each other while munching on their snacks.

It's recess time at the Marie Reine Immaculee primary school for girls. Looking at them one would never guess what these girls went through on January 12. Many lost parents, brothers, sisters, teachers, friends and their homes.

The original school, located in the centre of Jacmel, was severely damaged – the inside completely upside down, huge gaping cracks in the walls and collapsed offices. The school is now in an open field where Plan has set up temporary classrooms to get these girls back to school.

This is the perfect example of Plan's integrated approach to helping the Haitian government re-establish and improve the education system. To get the children back into class as soon as possible, Plan has put up sunshades with walls of woven palm leaves that we will replace with temporary school structures as materials arrive. Plan is also building latrines for the teachers and students.

Many of these girls are living in temporary camps in various locations around the city; others are living in tents and makeshift shelters outside their homes – afraid to go in. Polencia, one of the girls at the school, now lives in a tent in a crowded camp.

Her face and disposition change completely as she transitions from school and her friends, and heads 'home' to the camp. At school she is her old self. In her new 'home' she is one of many, struggling to survive.

Towards the close of the school day, a grandmother came a little bit early to pick up her granddaughters from school. While she waited she talked about what this all meant to her and her family.

She talked about despair and anxiety about what would happen to her granddaughters. She talked of how her hope was restored when she heard that Plan was going to help. Plan promised, and Plan delivered. And today her granddaughters are back in class.

Read more about Plan's response in Haiti