Beautifil Giver at age 88! Mme. Marie Marthe Balin Franck Paul! 71 Years a Teacher in Haitian Schools and still Principal of the College Canapé Vert that she founded in 1974
Another great Haitian!
MARIE MARTHE BALIN FRANCK PAUL as a new mother, early 1960s.
Serving as Mayor of Port-au-Prince, latter 1980s, after peoples’ rebellion ousted “Baby Doc” Duvalier.
Nov. 16, 2024
Madame Marie Marthe Balin Franck Paul is now 88.
She was a young prodigy. Born April 19, 1936, she was the youngest child of Leon Balin, Chief Justice of Haiti’s Supreme Court before his passing in 1947. She graduated from University in 1954, age 17, and at once began to reach in Haiti’s countryside. She married business-man Franck Paul in 1959. While teaching in Haiti’s capital of Port-au-Prince during the 1960s, she became mother to three sons: the subsequent author Marc Franck Paul, or “Francky”’; the subsequent composer and guitarist Jean Hervé; and Claude Hector, her present aide at College Canapé Vert in Port-au-Prince.
Francky—so resembling Bob Marley—and Claude Hector and Jean Hervé.
Madame Franck Paul founded this College in 1974. It has since graduated more than 20,000 students to advance to University themselves.
Mme. Franck Paul with two former College Canapé Vert students. The image is a video-still from the fine documentary by Le Nouveulliste journalist, CLAUDE BERNARD SERANT, “Madame Franck Paul / un enseignante exceptionale’.
Between 1986 and 1988, following mass rebellion that led to ouster of “Baby Doc” Duvalier, Mme. Franck Paul served as Mayor of Port-au-Prince and Haiti’s Minister of Education. Her brief tenure introduced Programs that created urban farming and satellites for one-teacher-per-10-students education in Port-au-Prince and other Arrondisements of Haiti.
She’s also found time to author more than 20 books. Her stories for children are led by the wholesome and fearless MADAME ROGER.
Further adventures of Madame Roger, above—video-still from Sérant’s excellent documentary—the blurriness owes entirely to moi.
Madame Franck also wrote songs and produced albums of her songs with Haitian musicians.
Here’s “Loulou”, meant to teach, as you’ll hear, Haitian children “their Vowels.”
Here’s “On A Voile La Lune”, composed in 2012, two years after the 7.1 Earthquake devastated Port-au-Prince and College Canapé Vert.
Madame Franck Paul’s great companion in projects from 1987 onward was her older sister, Miche Balin Déjean, wife of Joseph Déjean, Haiti’s Ambassador to the Organization of American States and then to Mexico and then to Great Britain in the 1940s and 1950s before threat of assassination forced Joseph to flee Haiti.
Miche was College Canapé Vert’s treasurer and the foremost champion of her younger sister’s creations.
The sisters and their allies rebuilt College Canapé Vert after a 7.1 Earthquake struck Port-au-Prince on January 12, 2010
The flattened square-block that was formely College Canapé Vert.
College Canapé Vert, rebuilt, 2015.
Miche passed suddenly in March 2015. Marie Marthe has persevered—like the whole of Haiti may be said to have persevered—into our 2024.
Enrollment at College Canapé Vert is now risen to 491 students, from Kindergarten to Pre-University Grade 12.
At the same time, Madame Franck Paul has grown a vision and project that she calls Lékol Toupatou—meaning School Everywhere in Haiti’s very melodic and percussive Kréyol language—into a reality that’s 148 Half-Hours of Video-Lessons strong. She and a Team of Staff and Students at College Canapé Vert have recorded and edited and further fine-tuned these Lessons since early 2020.
When school was closed due to ‘Manifestations’ on streets and Boulevards of Port-au-Prince 2021-2021, Marie Marthe and star former student Lijensky recorded in the still incompletely rebuilt structure of her home.
Please check out Lèkol Toupatou on the stickingupforchildren.com Website.
You may also want to hear a short clip, about 15 seconds in its edit, of the Chanson for JAMBARS, the ‘Organic Artisan Energy-Bars’ that have so helped Students and Teachers among Sticking Up For Children’s four Partners. Eight-olds at College Canapé Vert intone the Chorus of this Song—” Jam-Bar Jam-Bar / It makes you strong.”
Madame Franck Paul presents the latest arrival of JAMBARS to students, June 2022.
May we thank Madame Franck Paul for ALL her gifts. Tambien, may we never accept slurs against Haitians again, knowing what this simply summary of one person and family tells.
“Honor!” “Respect”
More about Francky is over in the Big Trunk of the WeAreRevolutions Website. Just scroll down through the 22 Hours of Maryse’s and my Spiritual as Music series.
More about Miche and Joseph is also in that Big Trunk among the Poems tab.
Madame Franck Paul continues with the same goals and strength she’s ever shown. 491 students—the most in this decade—now attend College Canapé Vert. She herself is a like a tree whom more and more see as it grows its branches. This past Summer she was recognized among 50 Haitian Women who are Models and Inspirations.
Finally, as Lagniappe, dear Readers, you may want to check out DAVID AMRAM as David thanks Madame Franck Paul in this video of 2022. David turns 94 tomorrow!
