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Story of Hope
Haitian native Ruth Paul-Caudle '98 pens a children's book to raise money for a school she founded in her homeland.

By Fern Schumer

Ruth Paul-Caudle '98 started the Spirit of Truth School in Haiti, where less than half of the population is literate, according to the United Nations Children's Fund. (Photo by Sonya Martin Photography)

Ruth Paul-Caudle '98 is a long way from home. But, in many ways, she has never left.
 
Thirteen years ago, Paul-Caudle came to Lake Forest College, after growing up in Kenscoff, Haiti (near Port-au-Prince), a town so poor that the houses didn't have electricity. Now, through her recently released children's book, she is bringing her Haitian homeland to an American audience.
 
The brightly illustrated Yvette, Annette and Renette, (Haiti World, 2007) is based upon a story Paul-Caudle heard as a child. Paul-Caudle, 34, looks out the living room window of her beautiful Vernon Hills, Illinois, home — filled with Haitian art and knick-knacks — as she remembers the village bonfire where elders gathered to tell folk stories. "We didn't have television," she says, "so this was our only entertainment." 
 
With vivid pictures and words capturing the people and the landscape of Haiti, the book tells the story of a pastor who notices that one family with triplet daughters never brings all three girls to church together at the same time. Through this family that only has one Sunday-best dress that the girls take turns wearing, Paul-Caudle introduces readers to the poverty in one of the poorest and most densely populated countries in the Western Hemisphere.  About 80 percent of the rural population lives below the poverty line, according to the World Bank.
     
 Paul-Caudle hopes to help change that. All proceeds of the book go to the Spirit of Truth School in Guibert, Haiti, which Paul-Caudle founded five years ago. 
      
"The only way to break poverty," says Paul-Caudle, an energetic, unassuming woman, "is to educate children. When illiteracy is high, people are easily misled. As Poet Maya Angelou said, 'When you know better, you do better.'" 
      
Two crucial events in Paul-Caudle's life taught her to "know better." The first occurred in 1997 on Lake Forest College's study abroad program when Paul-Caudle worked at UNESCO in Paris. "I was introduced to the global issues of child labor and child prostitution," she says. "That experience opened my eyes to the world."
      
The second event occurred in 1999 when she returned to Haiti for the funeral of her father, Edner Paul, a pastor and pillar of the community. "Thousands of people came," she recalls. "Cars snaked down the mountain for over a mile. People fought to carry his coffin. He had touched so many lives." 
 
Paul-Caudle remembered that she and her 11 brothers and sisters suspected that the family lived below its means, but the children never knew why. ÒAt the funeral, people told me my father had paid their hospital and school bills. Listening to these stories changed me. I finally understood that we lived with less - so others could live." 
 
Two years later, after visiting the orphanage that her father had founded, Paul-Caudle asked how she could help. "I was thinking IÕd give a $200 donation," she says. "Instead, they asked me to build a school so the children, some only four years old, wouldnÕt have to walk over two hours each way to and from school."
 
Paul-Caudle began fundraising by organizing a gospel concert. While buying fabric at a local store, a customer overheard Paul-Caudle tell the clerk that she was making costumes for a concert to fund a Haitian school. But at the cash register, Paul-Caudle discovered that she had left her wallet at home. That customer, who was next in line, wrote a check for the bill of $250. 
    
"I was floored," she says, still moved to tears by the kindness of this stranger. "I was dumbfounded. But I never saw her again.
   
"What I've learned is that I can't build a school alone. But when I do something worthwhile, others walk alongside and help. Americans have big hearts; they give to people they've never met in a faraway land." 
 
After raising $20,000, Paul-Caudle sent American carpenters to Haiti to build the school. In 2003, The Spirit of Truth School opened its doors to 40 children. This year, the school serves 300 students at the orphanage and in the surrounding neighborhoods.
 
Paul-Caudle has a special touch when recruiting for her cause. While visiting one of Professor of French Cynthia Hahn's classes at the College, Paul-Caudle asked students, "'How many of you are or are related to someone who is foreign born?' Practically every hand went up," Hahn says. "She knew how to make every student identify with her immigrant story."
 
Not only does Paul-Caudle's book introduce readers to Haitian children, it also features American children who are trying to help poor children around the world. One is Paul-Caudle's neighbor, Smith Donelon, who in fourth grade raised enough money by selling food and artwork to pay for 60 backpacks, blankets, and hats to send to Spirit of Truth students.
 
No matter where she goes she builds community.  "At Lake Forest College," says Paul-Caudle, who is now the mother of three, "I found people who looked like me; there were many African Americans. I found people who spoke my language; the College has many international students and many speak French. The College was the perfect fit for me." 
 
When Paul-Caudle married American Brian Caudle in 1998, the bride's entire wedding party was from Lake Forest College. Forty friends from the United States flew to Haiti for the event.  Once again, Paul-Caudle brought her home with her. 

Fern Schumer is a writer based in Lake Bluff.