My Journey

Yes. I’m aware. It has been a reallyyyyy long time since my last post. Sorry. Sooooo with that out of the way, here it is. 

Year One DONE! I’ve officially been in Rwanda for over a year. In the past year I’ve been riding the rollercoaster of intense emotions and strange experiences that make up a Peace Corps Volunteer’s service. I’ve felt extreme joy, sadness, excitement, loneliness, self-fulfillment, and most of all pride. We’re almost done with the school year, and I can’t even begin to describe how proud I am of the great strides that my students have made at school. As proud and happy I am with my students, I think I am most satisfied with the progress that my teachers are making in our trainings. I’m watching them grow into strong mentors for their colleagues thanks to their dedication to education and to some very supportive NGOs, Peace Corps Staff, and Rwanda Education Board Staff. 

Have you ever had the feeling that you really belong somewhere? Or had a sudden realization like “Wow, this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.” If you haven’t ever found a passion so strong that makes all of the challenges worth it, I hope that you find it. Everyone deserves to experience this. When I was young, everyone in my family would joke and tell me that I would either be a teacher or a vet. As I grew up I always fought them and said no, I wanted to be a… marine biologist…forensic scientist… anthropologist… marine biologist… Until one day, I met a sixth grade teacher, Mr. Axelrad. I will never forget this man, and what he taught me, and the path he sent me down. To this day I don’t think he understands, or is even aware, of how massive of an impact he had on my life. Mr. A, as he was fondly called by his students, was a social studies teacher. My favorite subject. He would always tell us about the teaching he had done in Zimbabwe (or maybe it was Zambia?), and the time he spent there working with his wife. I was always fascinated by his stories, and this “community-based culture” that he would talk about. I wanted to know more, to experience it. By the end of sixth grade I had narrowed down my choices for college to either teaching in third-world countries or becoming a marine biologist. By the time I reached high school, I knew. I would be a teacher. Not a teacher like the ones I had in high school, but a teacher like those I had in elementary and middle school. A good teacher. A teacher who helped students learn. A teacher who didn’t discourage their students. A teacher who didn’t give up on their students.

In high school, I was a difficult child (to put it lightly). My teachers gave up on me, and always told me that I wouldn’t go anywhere in life. I was stupid, I was useless. What they didn’t know was how much I was going through outside of school. My abusive relationship. Substance abuse. They didn’t know, and they didn’t care to find out. Despite everything, my guidance counselor, vice principle, and principle never gave up on me. They knew I was smart. They knew I had potential. So they never gave up. They pushed me through high school until I was accepted by Keene State. There. That small state college, is where everything really began. 

I wanted to prove my high school teachers wrong. That I was a good student. That I could do it. I was motivated, taking classes I enjoyed, and living far away from a place that had only caused me pain for so many years. In college, I met so many professors who influenced the way I now view the world. They shaped my thinking. They shaped my profession. It is because of people like Mr. A, Mr. Martin, Dr. Len Fleischer, Dr. Paul Vincent, and Dr. Therese Seibert that I am now in Rwanda serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer.  

Now, I am that teacher that I aspired to be. I will never give up on my students, no matter what they are going through. I will always try to understand what they are going through outside of school before I judge their behavior. And most of all, I hope that I can support and inspire just one student to follow their dreams and accomplish things that they always thought were impossible. The challenges are worth it, and I feel like I have finally found my purpose. Here, as a teacher in a small, rural village in Eastern Rwanda.

This post is to thank all of the people who supported me throughout my journey to get here, and to all of those who have yet to enter my life and have a positive impact. Thank you. It is because of you that I am here, that I am happy, and that I am growing into the person I always aspired to be.

What Else is New?

In the past few months, things have been crazy busy! I’m now teaching/ doing teacher training in 5 different schools within my sector, teaching English at the health center, and organizing various different secondary projects. A lot has happened so I’m going to try my best to keep this post organized and less all-over-the-place.

So let’s start with school updates! As I said before I am now working in 5 schools within my sector, the farthest being a 20 minute moto into one of the valleys, and all others being within an hour walk from my house. For term 2, my English Girls & Boys Club has been meeting every week so far and the students are really starting to come out of their shells. When we started a few months ago, my students were so afraid of speaking that our club was mostly silent. Now, they organize their own meetings (in addition to our club time), prepare things to share with other students, and love to speak and ask questions. I saw them meeting on their own for the first time last week, and was so excited I almost cried. Naturally I was jumping up and down, clapping, and smiling up a storm, and the students said “teacher, what is wrong?” When I told them I was so happy and proud of them they all giggled and looked at me like I was crazy. I’m fine with it :) I think part of this change is because 10 of my students join the APPEGA Boarding School English Club every Monday (I go with them twice a month) to practice their English skills. Regardless of what is causing this confidence, I couldn’t be happier. My students are speaking and listening, and they no longer fear using English with their peers. The little moments like this make every other struggle completely worth it.

In addition to taking some huge steps forward with my students, I have also started working with teachers at my school to decide upon a secondary project for the school. Although it is stressful as all hell, the teachers just look at me and say “please be patient with us, we know you are using much power”. After a week of voting mayhem, and disputes between teachers and administration, we finally counted the ballots and the teachers have decided that they would like to create a sustainable animal husbandry project to benefit students and teachers. We’re still in the initial planning stages and just trying to figure out exactly what this project will look like, but for the first time I am really seeing them come together as a staff. The goals for our project will be to increase education about animal husbandry within the students, teachers, and greater community, to provide malnourished students with resources to begin their own animal husbandry projects at home, to gain income for the school which can be used to fund other projects, and to increase the sense of community well being among school staff members. It’s a big project, and I’m a little nervous about it, but here’s to hoping for the best!

Now, onto teacher training! So as of right now, I am doing teacher training sessions in 3 schools, with two sessions per month at each school. We are focusing on student-centered learning activities, creating teaching resources from locally-available materials, as well as discussing positive classroom management techniques. In July, we’ll be starting the Sector-wide Teacher Training Sessions with the help of my first Peace Corps Grant! We’ll have the first 2 of 5 trainings, and will be meeting with all School Based Mentors (SBMs) and English Teachers to discuss new methodology, the new curriculum, classroom management, and even phonics. If this whole training series is successful, we will open up the trainings to be available to other subject teachers next year!

Last thing, I promise! We are also in the process of gathering necessary information to submit a grant for a Permagarden Training that would provide all community health workers in my sector with training on creating climate resistant permagardens to help fight malnutrition in our area. Everyone is super excited, which gives me hope that the trainings will go well and these practices will be implemented. As much as I love working with my health center, I am very excited for them to be getting their very own Peace Corps Volunteer in the beginning of August! I know it will reduce the amount of work that I do with them, but I’m hoping for a great volunteer who is as motivated as they are to improve the health among our communities. If that means I am a little less busy, I’m OK with it :) 

Just kidding… We also had an inauguration ceremony for our new classrooms which led to free lunch with the mayor of my district, free transport to Kigali, and the worst sunburn I’ve had since 7^th grade… AND I attended my first traditional Rwandan wedding for my neighbor Ben’s sister. The ceremony was beautiful and it was so cool to see how these weddings happen. We started the day at 8:30 am after ZERO sleep, attended the traditional ceremony, missed the religious ceremony because we had a small car accident (don’t worry, just a small fender bender), went to the reception, then had the final ceremony where we left the bride in her new home with her new husband. By the time we got home it was after midnight. Even though we were all exhausted, I was super sick, and the car had a few bumps and bruises, the wedding was awesome and I’m so happy that I was invited to participate in all of the ceremonies! 

Well, that’s it for now! Enjoy some pictures and I promise I’ll be better about posting again in the next couple of weeks!

World Malaria Month 2016

Guess what time it is?! It’s World Malaria Month and Peace Corps Rwanda is having our annual competition for raising awareness. What is this “competition” you might ask? Well, PCVs from every region in Rwanda host and participate in events to raise awareness about malaria and the prevention of this disease. The winning region gets a prize, and individuals compete for gift cards, free nights at hotels, and delicious foods that we don’t usually have (i.e. cake WITH frosting). 

World Malaria Month also coincides with the transition from the short rainy season to the long dry season, where we see a serious spike in the number of malaria cases throughout the country. For those of you who aren’t aware, here are a few fun/not-so-fun facts about malaria:

3.2 billion people live in areas at risk of malaria transmission throughout 106 countries and territories (cdc.gov)

     The World Health Organization estimates that there were about 214 million clinical cases of malaria worldwide, resulting in 438,000 deaths (cdc.gov)

     90% of the deaths caused by malaria world-wide occur in Africa, with children under the age of 5 being most at risk.

     In my sector, considered to be an extremely rural area, our health center receives between 200-250 new cases of malaria daily during the transition seasons.

 

Sooooo I’ll admit, this was supposed to be posted about a month ago and I just didn’t have time to do it. We have concluded World Malaria Month and I am proud to say that the East (my region) was the winner of this year’s competition! In my village, I did several bed net care and repair demonstrations, checked nets at the local boarding school/ helped them apply to receive new nets, and taught lessons to kids at various different schools. Enjoy the pictures :)