Just some angst going on inside my head these days. I read about projects in the DR that are truly helping the people there. Projects like the fundación Alta Gracia that Julia Alvarez helped to set up that promotes agricultural sustainability while providing work for farmers in the central highlands.(http://www.cafealtagracia.com/links.html) and the Institute for Integrative Medicine (http://integrativedev.interactivemedialab.com/Home.aspx) whose projects include one in which recycled grocery bags are crocheted into handbags and whose profits help to feed and educated dominican children (wow, that was a long and perhaps not even run-on sentence). And I wonder if our little camp is doing any good. I mean for two weeks we provide 20 or so children with an education that they wouldn't otherwise get. We talk to them about their community and environment in an attempt to instill in them a (what's the word?) sensibility about the way they co-exist. But can we actually accomplish this goal in two weeks? Do our actions result in any change whatsoever?
Tanya, forever the optimist, will say that of course we are doing good. That we are providing these children with a positive learning experience; one which, even if it doesn't lead to permanent, visible change, will nonetheless affect these children. How, I ask? But I guess I know that the answer is the same as how I impact my math students here in Brookline, right?
Still... I think we should think bigger. Or maybe attach ourselves to one of the organizations that is already doing great work in the D.R. I don't know, I guess I always feel some angst as we pass the midpoint of the summer, regardless of what I'm doing.
Consider: "Are you helping WHOM?" Are you helping all of humanity or all of the DR? Well, perhaps not. But are you helping the 20-30 kids who come to the camp? How could you not be?
ReplyDeleteI feel the same way about this at BHS, too, as you do. Sometimes I wonder, "Am I really teaching these kids anything--or anything of great value?" Then I remember what someone (Mike F?) once told me: that often what the kids learn is that they can learn, that there are adults out there who are willing to help them, that there are resources out there.
What many don't get is that you can't measure all results and outcomes, no matter how good the rubric or the test, as so much that's important is unpredictable, it seems to me.
@JP: "as we pass the midpoint of the summer"
ReplyDeleteAre we at the midpoint of the summer already? I don't think so, but you're freaking me out a little.
I love the questions you're asking. I have no answers.
I figure all teachers ask themselves these questions periodically. In this case, perhaps the issue is simply what Elon has pointed out--that you may be providing kids with a sense of opportunity and that there is something else in the world besides what they know in their small community.
ReplyDeleteMy 6th grade students (Newton) develop "Action Plan" projects in which they try to advocate for making a positive impact in the world. I wonder if we could connect them somehow to your camp, or at least put it out there as a possibility...are there students here in the Boston area involved in what you're doing?
We would welcome the involvement of your students Ben. I don't know how that would work yet, but I'll bring it up at camp this summer and be in touch. As far as other groups working in the DR: A former colleague of mine named Juan Casillas, who currently teaches at Cambridge Ringe brings a group of students to the DR every year. They have adopted, as it were, a small community, and have helped to build a basketball court and a library.
DeleteJosh, what a pleasure to read this blog because I really didn't even know about this part of your life. I love how your blog shows the mixture of optimism (in the form of Tanya) and skepticism/worry (in the form of you). This is the natural and healthy tension in any sort of social action. I'm dying to know about the plants! My Spanish is poor, but I still watched the videos of the kids reading their poems. To write and read a poem aloud is a powerful experience for anyone, small as it may seem.
ReplyDeleteStrangely enough, I just read, completely out of the blue, a story about the DR by Junot Diaz last night.