To ensure such students continue learning, a group of returnee teachers has set up an education centre in the commune of Mabanda in Makamba Province, near Tanzania. The teachers work without pay.
"We couldn't just sit back while our children faced a lack of education due to a language barrier," Norbert Bitaboneka, the principal, told IRIN.
Swahili and English are the languages of instruction at the facility, the Centre Prévisionnel de l'Afrique de l'Est (East African Planning Centre), in line with the Tanzanian curriculum. The language of instruction in Burundian schools is French.