Year One Done!

It has officially been over a year in country, almost a year in my village (ten more days), and we have finished the 2016 academic year. The students are at home or visiting relatives, the school is calm and quiet with closed gates and doors, and the dust is finally starting to settle. As happy as I am to be on "vacation", it is a constant battle between never ending boredom and trying to find things to do. I find myself balancing my days with community English classes, permagarden trainings, and hiding in my house from the hordes of small children to catch up on some much-needed introvert time with my chickens and my dog. So here are some updates from the past few months.

Have you ever been so busy that you can picture yourself looking like a cartoon character running around burning holes in the soles of your shoes and having steam coming out of your ears? If not, lucky you; but if you know exactly what I'm talking about, komera my friend, the end of the craziness has to come eventually (even if it seems like something that is just out of your reach, you'll get there). Now, I am enjoying a hot cup of coffee listening to the birds’ chirp and reflecting on the last few months and finishing up some project progress reports. In the last few months I have finished up the first year of teacher trainings, implemented the permagarden grant with my friends at the local health center, brought my students on a field trip (their first one ever BTW), and am about to go to Boys Excellence (BE) camp with 6 of my best boy students next week. 

Let's start with teacher trainings and permagardening. The teacher trainings were extremely successful with the school-based mentors (SBMs), so we are expanding that training program to the district level. Next year I'll be working with 56 schools in Rwamagana District to train SBMs on student-centered methodology and how to implement school-level trainings for their colleagues. Fingers crossed we will have a great year and show the district how meaningful professional development activities are for teachers, but I must admit I am a bit nervous to run such an extensive program and not be able to have full oversight at every school. But here's to hoping. 

The permagarden training program has been by far the most successful program I have facilitated so far. In the next two days, we will be finished with initial training program, then in January we will continue to implement a village-level nutrition education program and cooking classes using the vegetables grown in our gardens. So far in the last 6 weeks we have 73 gardens built throughout the sector and 1,932 people trained out of the about 26,000 people living in my sector. If we were to continue this pace, we could have every person in our sector trained on drought resistant gardening techniques within the next two years. The community health workers have been absolutely amazing and have facilitated 73 village-level trainings, plus built example gardens at their homes. Without their hard work and dedication to fighting malnutrition, none of this would be possible. Oh, and did I mention that they are volunteers?! Meaning no salary to do full time jobs. They truly are the hardest working people I have ever met. 

Now let's move on to the field trip. So, thanks to a close family friend, Kenny Hamel, my English Club students were able to go on their first field trip. We spent the third term learning language that had to do with peace and conflict resolution, and working with some staff from Never Again Rwanda who taught the kids about the history of Rwanda and mass conflict. To conclude their lessons, we rented a bus and brought the students to the Gisozi Genocide Memorial in Kigali. I just want to point out how this was the idea of my students. At the beginning of the term, I allow my students to come up with a list of unit topics, then from that list they vote on the topic. After voting they told me "Teacher please, we want to go to the memorial. We have never seen it". So, thanks to Kenny, this dream and many others came true. That morning a big express bus came and picked us up from school, the students well equipped with their club t-shirts, water, tissues, and biscuits. As we were navigating the bumpy, curvy, treacherous road down from my village, it was brought to my attention that this was the first time many of my students had ever been on an express bus. The day as full of firsts: first time in an express bus, first time in Kigali, first time to visit a museum or genocide memorial, first time to eat in a restaurant, and first time to see a plane take off from the airport as we drove by. I couldn't have even imagined the significance of a trip like this for them, but I am so happy that it worked out.

This next week, we are going to BE camp. I'm bringing six of my best students from English Club to participate. Before bringing students to camp, I make a point to visit their families and discuss with them about the importance of camp and to tell them about how great their kids are (parents only hear the negative news about their students; complimenting isn't really a thing here). These visits were especially strong. I had crying single mothers, overcrowded houses, and stories about how my students are the ones that hold the family together. I wasn't necessarily surprised, but to visit the families and to see where my students are coming from you can really put into perspective how hard it is for them to study and succeed in school. Yet, somehow, they are some of the top students in their classes. I know that by bringing the students to camp, it will just act as yet another reason to stay motivated at school. They are an absolutely phenomenal group of boys, and I have high hopes for them.