Sister Wanda Garczyńska of God’s Will (1891–1954) was born in Lviv. She grew up in a home with patriotic traditions. She attended the educational institutions in Niżniów and Jazłowiec and the Wanda Niedziałkowska Women’s High School in Lviv. During World War I, as a volunteer nurse, she worked in military hospitals in Kiev and Lviv; she also helped in orphanages for children, and organized scouting activities. Her passion and life mission was teaching. In 1919, she graduated from the Teachers’ College in Krakow, and in 1925—from the Higher Courses for Teachers in Lviv. In 1926, she entered the Congregation of the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. After that, she taught in the schools of the Immaculate Conception in Jazłowiec and Jarosław.
In 1934, she became the head of the private primary school of the Congregation at 59 Kazimierzowska Street in Warsaw’s [Warszawa] Mokotów district. From 1940, when the facility was closed by the German authorities, until she left before it was burnt down in mid-August 1944, the school held secret classes covering the secondary school curriculum for girls and boys, and secret university lectures. At Kazimierzowska, help was provided to Jewish children from the Warsaw ghetto, displaced persons from the nearby bombed houses and refugees. In March 1983, the Yad Vashem Institute of National Remembrance awarded Sister Wanda Garczyńska posthumously with the Righteous Among the Nations Medal.
After the end of World War II, Sister Wanda Garczyńska organized a female gymnasium and a boarding school in Wałbrzych-Sobięcin. In June 2012, the Educational Foundation named after sister Wanda Garczyńska was established there. Its task is to support the unemployed, the poor, single mothers with children and to implement programs for the promotion of professional activation and health, as well as to support educational activities.
A Work Built to Last…