Paoua, Central African Republic. Agnès Sadoua is just seven years old. Perched on the edge of a wooden bench, she swings her legs back and forth freely. Like many other children her age, she is missing her front teeth. She grins as she talks about her love for school, her friends and her family. It has not always been like this however. Three months ago, Agnès along with many other children and their families, were forced to flee their homes in search of safety in the bush.

“Mama woke me up early, we hurriedly dressed and left the house. I was very scared, I didn’t understand what was happening.” Getting up so early was unusual for Agnès. Because of the ongoing conflict in the country’s northeast, she had not been able to attend school for many months. “We left the house in silence, it was still dark” she recalls. As they walked down the street, the family were joined by the other villagers.

Clutching her younger brother’s hand, Agnès describes how she began the long walk to safety. The only luggage the family were able to carry was the small bundle that the mother carried on her head. “I remember the walk through thick bush and the pain in my legs” winces Agnès. The terrified villagers were purposely avoiding the roads, afraid of the bandits and armed groups who regularly patrol the Paoua area.

In the evening they stopped at an abandoned hut next to a field. It is here where they have stayed ever since, living solely from the cassava growing beside them. Agnès describes to UNICEF the loneliness she felt, “there were no other children for miles around and Mama said it was not safe for me to go and look for them.”

A few weeks later things changed however. Agnès describes how some “people with matching hats” came to talk to her mother. “They brought blankets, kitchen utensils and cereals.” Some of the parents from other families in the forest had cleared a space in the surrounding wood and had set-up a shelter made of forks and a tarpaulin.

Agnès describes how the same people returned a day later, this time with blackboards, stationary and other equipment which were given to the children. Someone also arrived to begin teaching lessons under the tarpaulin. Agnès recalls fondly the memory of being reunited with the other children from her village and being given the ability to go to school again.

The joint programme between UNICEF and COOPI has meant that Agnès along with ten thousand other children are now able to attend school in the bush, a temporary solution to a region that has long been ravaged by war. It is hoped in time that UNICEF will be able to extend its programme and establish more permanent schools and promote a far-reaching “Back to School Campaign.” For the moment however, the bush schools provide both schooling and a sense of normalcy for some of the country’s most vulnerable children.