MIT linguistics professor and native Kreyòl speaker Michel DeGraff directs the MIT-Haiti Initiative, launched in 2010 in collaboration with Vijay Kumar (now associate dean of open learning), other MIT faculty and staff, and leaders in Haitian education. The main objective is to enhance STEM education in Haiti with active-learning pedagogy and technology and through the use of Kreyòl as language of instruction.

In 2015, Haiti’s government, through an agreement between the Ministry of Education and the Haitian Creole Academy (of which DeGraff is a founding member), announced that it would promote Kreyòl as language of instruction at all levels of the school system.

However, the availability and quality of educational resources for STEM in Kreyòl has not yet caught up to the new policy and will be critical to its implementation.

MIT Better World