JOMA!

Above is a picture of me with my students and their certificates from the conference that they attended
I think that I have mentioned before that I have been working with a theater group at the school through a Peace Corps program called JOMA. The weekend before last I had an opportunity to take 8 of the kids from the group to a weekend conference a few hours away. They get everything provided for them (transportation, food, lodging) which is great because most of these kids have little to no money to be able to travel like that. I was so excited to go and the weekend was a blast!!!

There were about 62 kids representing 8 different schools in Maputo and Gaza province there. The weekend was full of sessions educating the students on topics like domestic violence, STDs, HIV/AIDS, puberty, pregnancy, self-esteem, and leadership. The kids were so dynamic in the sessions. I was surprised that even while talking about some of the less comfortable health topics, students always had something to say. There were also two Mozambican health workers there to test people for HIV. The majority of the kids elected to get tested and it was a nice opportunity for them to do the test in a safe place. Many people here are afraid to get tested in their own towns because confidentiality here isn't what it is in the US and people think that everyone in their community will know their status if it comes out positive. Some travel to other health centers farther away, but most don't have the money to do that.

At night we held activities like musical chairs or dances or other team building exercises. The kids all made fast friends with each other and it was a really positive environment for them. So many students here love to perform! Whether it was dance, song, poems, theater, or jokes, every student had something to share and on the last night we held a talent show where each group presented something and a group of the girls put on a beauty pageant (with judges and everything).

I'm pretty sure the kids barely slept all weekend. I know for sure that the first night a group of kids woke up at 4am to play soccer before breakfast and the second night they woke up at midnight to play for a while. The volunteers there (including myself) also barely slept and tried to keep things moving smoothly all weekend.

The women who worked in the kitchen preparing food did the hardest work of the weekend. The first night they cooked 27 chickens for all of us. That includes killing them by hand, plucking them, gutting them, butchering, and finally cooking them. It's hard work! The last night they also cooked two goats for us (and also had to kill, skin, and butcher them personally...it's just how it works here!). The food all weekend was delicious and I had a great time. I also think it inspired the kids in my group to keep up the hard work so that they can have other similar opportunities!

Bom Dia Senhora Professora

"Bom dia Senhora Professora!" or "Good Morning Teacher!" is how I am greeted by all of the students (in unison) when I walk into any classroom. It's actually a really nice way to start off a class and can sometimes be a nice pick-me-up on a tiring day.

So for the blog post this week I have decided to give a brief explanation about how the school system here works:

There are two levels of schools here. There is primary school which is 1st-7th grade and secondary school which is 8th-12th grade. School is also not free. The high school kids had to pay about 550 mets for the year which is about 15 dollars US. It doesn't seem like a lot of money to us, but for Mozambicans it really is. I know a couple of students who are doing night school now because years ago they had to stop going to school so that a sibling would go to school. In his family the kids took turns attending school for a couple of years at a time because the family could only pay for one child to go to school each year. He is now 27 years old and is in the 11th grade. This happens a lot so I have many 10th,11th, or 12th graders who are 21, 22 or even 25 years old.
The grading system here is also very different. All of their grades are out of 20 points and a 10 is passing. Yes, 50% is passing, and still SO many students fail every exam. I corrected a 12th grade chemistry exam that I gave last week and out of 25 kids I had ONE student pass and I'm pretty sure he guessed on all of the answers (it was multiple choice). The school likes to see a passing rate of around 70-80% per discipline, but there are some teachers with a passing rate of as low as 30%.
Another issue is that the schools are not completely honest with what they do with the money. For example, in this years matriculation fees for the kids, it included money for their exams. You have to pay for every piece of paper printed or copied at the school since the school has no money. Every time I want to give a test I have to collect 1 or 2 mets from each kid to give them their test. (Someone suggested that as a volunteer I should pay for the tests for my kids,but I currently have about 745 students so for a two page test I have to collect 1490 mets) and I only get paid 6700 per month so it ends up being a big chunk out of my living allowance). Supposedly the kids paid their test money at the beginning of the school year and then the school just decided to use it for something else...
The school also uses a chunk of the money to pay a bakery to send a bread truck to the school every day to bring bread for the kids...but the kids then have to buy the bread when it is sent to the school...so it's like the kids pay twice for the bread...
Students here have a HUGE problem with cheating. I think that they think it's the only way for them to pass and many teachers let it go so the kids learn that they can get away with it. They get pretty upset when I give them zeroes on their exams for using their notebooks or cheat sheets, but they have to learn! They also talk all the time to each other during tests and there are so many of them that it's hard to control. My newest and most successful strategy is that if I catch a student talking to a friend I take 2 points off of their test and make them sit on the ground at the front of the classroom for the rest of their test. Mozambicans HATE getting dirty and the floor is always dirty or dusty and it's also cement which is not super comfortable to sit on.
The students are required to come to school 20 minutes before school starts, line up in front of the school, and sing the national anthem every day. I also am required to be there and have to stand in front of the students with the other teachers and sing (so I now know all of the words). The students are also responsible for keeping their classroom clean so every day before school they have to sweep the classroom. The class that I am responsible for borrows the broom from my house every morning, and many other classes pool together money to buy a class broom and a class eraser for the blackboard because it is not provided by the school. The students are also responsible for keeping the school grounds clean so every other Saturday all of the students are required to be at the school in the morning with their garden hoes or rakes to clean the school grounds.
I'm sure that I am forgetting to include all sorts of other interesting tidbits about the school system but that's all I have for now.
Here are some other interesting things that have happened to me this week:
-On my way here my shoe completely broke. What was I supposed to do with one shoe in the middle of town?! Luckily Xai Xai has many cobblers who re-sole and fix shoes so a guy across the street called me over and fixed my shoe in about two minutes. He also probably could have charged me anything for it since I was shoe-less but it was only 10 mets(30 cents)!
-My dog has been killing chickens/chicks that belong to my neighbors and even though I try to stop him/hide the evidence, they (very nicely) confronted me this week and asked me if I could keep him tied up at night. Thank God they like me.
-They built a KFC in XaiXai (I can't remember if I mentioned this) and it opened about 2 weeks ago. It is also a drive through and the only drive through that I have seen in Mozambique. There is a guard outside who instructs people on how to go through the drive-thru since most people have never used one before haha. ALSO since they drive on the other side of the road here, the drive-thru also goes the opposite way around the building....

That's all I've got for now...until next week...