Is it ok if I ramble a bit...?

About a week ago, twenty student-teachers arrived at my school from the University of Dar Es Salaam. They’re all pursuing degrees in education, and their stint here as teachers is an improvised internship. The Ministry of Education did well in implementing this student-teacher program- for the two months that they are here (and elsewhere throughout Tanzania), the constant pressure from the shortage of teachers, especially in upper levels, is relieved. Ihungo was provided with biology, chemistry, geography, math, history, economics, English, French, and Kiswahili teachers. Reread that last sentence. Yes, we were provided with teachers for every subject except physics. While the rest of Ihungo’s normal A-level teachers are enjoying a two-month vacation thanks to these student-teachers, yours truly is plodding along same as always. Honestly, I’m pleased that I don’t have to share my periods; I believe no one will prepare my students for their examinations as thoroughly as I do (more on this in a moment).

Additionally, it’s been nice having them around, socially. When I came here first, I found that the staff room was filled with older, well-experienced teachers. Unfortunately, what comes with their experience is often intractability to new ideas or undertakings. It would happen that I would speak up during a meeting with an (in my eyes) important viewpoint, only to get immediately shouted down by the elder teachers- “Well, that’s not how we do things here.” Yeah, that’s fine. With the arrival of the university students, I’ve found a group of dynamic, open people who want to become involved during their short stay. So far, this has only manifested itself in daily volleyball matches, lots of card games, and interesting discussions. While I’ve enjoyed this breath of fresh air in my social life, it seems that while these students are here, perhaps we can work together to foster structural changes in Ihungo’s environment. For once, the young, idealistic crowd has the majority over the middle-aged teachers and their static mindsets. It’s an opportunity…

With seeking to implement changes, however, a constant debate rears its head: should we try to alter the existing structure of an education system simply because we are products of a different one? That is, Tanzania has its own methods of instruction and discipline which are largely influenced by its cultural patterns and the behaviors of teachers and students alike. Perhaps ideas which are highly lauded in the US would find a poor breeding ground here, just due to these social differences. This is something I’ve had to consider and reflect on before bringing anything new to the staff. Even a concept and simple and fundamental to us as positive reinforcement (remember the star stickers that teachers put on the best papers?) was met with an amazing amount of resistance- “If we treat them nicely, the students will take try to take advantage of us.” Sadly, this can be sometimes true.

The main battleground for this debate tends to be the area of corporal punishment. To beat or not to beat… When teachers ask what discipline methods we use in the States, I usually mention detention, suspension, Saturday school, and the like. Invariably, the teachers will respond by laughing, telling me how ridiculous Americans are and that such methods would never work in Tanzania. Strangely, perhaps they are right. What would be the use of detention in a boarding school where the students have already been stripped of all their free time? In the international Peace Corps monthly magazine, I read an article titled “Punishing Lessons: How some of us whipped those kids into shape” that shocked me. Here, in this magazine which gets sent to every Peace Corps country in the world, reaching a minimum of 7,000 volunteers, was an article endorsing the use of corporal punishment, not only by local teachers but by us volunteers as well. The main argument stems from the debate I mentioned earlier- we as American guests never know the education system as well as the people who live there, and therefore it isn’t our prerogative to come in and try to affect changes. We don’t know what works, and the locals do. There was testimonial in this article from several past volunteers explaining their rationale for beating the students (one- “my students didn’t respect me until I hit them.” Another- “my head of school rated me as the best volunteer in the country after I started beating the students”). Does this give you a queasy feeling? It did me, when I read it. These volunteers seem to have followed the doctrine “if you can’t defeat them, join them,” and hit their students simply because they didn’t have any better solution. What the author of this article seems to have forgotten is that there are certain objective truths which transcend cultural beliefs and education systems. Studies have shown that corporal punishment is demeaning, engenders animosity, and hinders development. Granted, these studies were conducted in Western nations, but if one can believe their veracity, then it seems that one universal truth ought to be “beating is an ineffective, inhumane form of punishment.” Corporal punishment used to be the norm in American schools as well, and we gave it up when we realized its negative effects. Just because beating still occurs in some developing nations does not mean that it is the proper form of punishment for those nations. It means they haven’t yet realized, as we did, the absurdity of hitting those we are trying to teach. What do we hold onto when we travel from culture to culture and attempt to adapt? If we just give up all our values to follow the current customs, we lose sight of those objective truths and we never grow from our travels. In a sense, choosing to enjoin corporal punishment is choosing to turn a blind eye to a truth which we as Americans have already been exposed to: corporal punishment is wrong. Those who beat their students in order to adapt more readily to their society shouldn’t be congratulating themselves; they should be mourning the loss of their humanity and their values.

While I’m on morality, I should mention my own current crisis. Last year, for several months there was another teacher on the Ihungo staff that was capable of teaching A-level physics. The administration asked me to share my periods with him, and I did so, albeit reluctantly. During the short time he stayed here, this teacher developed a reputation for being a lazy drunkard. Without telling the school, I began teaching during the periods he was supposed to be in class. I didn’t care that he wasn’t responsible, I just wanted to help my students. After several months, he found work elsewhere and moved on. Now, a year later, he’s back. I’ve been told by several another teachers that he has changed, this is a different person altogether. Uh-huh. As it happens, again the school asked me to share my periods with him. The next topic we cover is electromagnetism, which is the same topic he was supposed to teach last year. This means I have no experience at all with how to present electromagnetism, how to prepare my students in it. So I agreed to give him a few periods per week, on the condition that he will finish electromagnetism and then give them back. My moral dilemma: did I make a mistake in giving this guy a second chance? He’s shown that he is an unreliable teacher, but he does know the topic we asked him to teach more thoroughly than I do. I didn’t really have time to go through my options when the administration asked me to give him periods, so only now am I reflecting on whether I made the right decision. Perhaps if I work closely with him, so that he feels me breathing down his neck, it will keep him on task. Let’s hope so, I don’t want to let these kids down.

Finally, on a sad note, I forgot to mention in my last post that my best friend of the last year left a few weeks ago. Manuel, the Laurel to my Hardy, got a job in DC working for a branch of the World Bank. Apparently, he’s working on international economics and development. Hats off, but Jodi and I are missing him something fierce. Over the year we all had together, the three of us became really close (as tends to happen in small town Africa). Jodi, cool as she is, just does not appreciate some of the ridiculousness that Manuel and I brewed up. I’ll miss him a lot over my last few months, I’m sure of it. Manuel- ulikuwa mbwa wangu wa kwanza kabisa. Sasa siwezi kujamba mara kwa mara kama zamani, tulipokuwa pamoja. Tutaonana siku nyingi, mtu wangu.