In 1961, two years after the revolution, Cuba recruited 100,000 youth to go to the countryside to teach peasants how to read and write. Within one year, these teachers, the majority of them young women and teenage girls, taught 707,000 Cubans to read and write, eradicating illiteracy, according to UNESCO standards, in one of the most successful literacy campaigns ever in the world. Cuba’s model of achieving Literacy is currently being adopted in over 50 nations.
Maestra celebrates this amazing story on the 50th anniversary of the literacy campaign through original film footage of the period, photographs and personal interviews of the teachers who are now in their 60's, 70's and 80's. As they tell their stories, the Cuban women reflect on the transformation of their own lives and the whole of Cuban society as a result of the literacy campaign. For most, it was the first time these women experienced independence and realized their power.
