Rollercoaster Week: 2.29.12

Updates from Daagbe: 2.28.12

- Teacher's Strike Continues. The permanent professors are still on strike and seem to plan to stay that way for a while. Figured out more of the reason: according to my fellow English profs, the president raised the salaries of all civil servants, except for the teachers (who also work for the government). They're mad, and the president doesn't want to give in because he raised their salaries a few years ago.

Whatever. The more immediate problem for me is what's going to happen to the kids and the school year. If the strike keeps going a long time, the government and/or UNESCO might declare an "année blanchee" -- a blank year, meaning that this whole year would be erased and they'd start again next year. That would royally suck, nor only because all of my teaching work this year would be void, but also because projects would get way harder to finish. Girls might have trouble coming to girl's club if they're not already at the school, and getting into the library would be tougher (but still doable, and I am getting that thing done by June).

Luckily, most profs I talk to think we still have time to resolve the strike before that (cross your fingers). We have lost a LOT of school, so they might extend the school year a few weeks or a month, especially since now the permanent profs have decided to work only Mondays (before it was Mon and Fri). That would mess with project/camp dates maybe, but hopefully not too much.

So that's the state of the strike at the moment. Sucks for the kids, especially since the school year (once you take out exam weeks, days off and breaks) is about 6 months long to begin with. Throw in several months of striking and... Yeah, it is kind of a blank year.


- Other Bad News. One of my students, a smiley 13- or 14-year-old girl named Melanie, dropped out of school over the last week and a half. She's pregnant and, according to her classmates, now living at her husband's house. Husband. Heartbreaking. My amazing professor friend Florence told me she plans to go to the house to try to convince her to come back to school at least until the baby's born, but that's not terribly likely... Often the husband doesn't allow the girl to go back (because she'll think too much and become too "emancipated"), or the parents won't let her because it wouldn't be proper. Other times it's the girl who just considers that part of her life over, and she quits to become the grand lady she wants to be. I hope she comes back, and if it's a forced marriage, you can bet I'll be on the phone in two seconds to get her help, but unfortunately, I can't hold my breath.


- Now That I've Thoroughly Depressed You... My library has shelves! And we got all of the school's books out of the boxes and put them on the shelves. It looks pretty cool already, and administration is suddenly really proud of it. :) Entertainingly, the second we started taking the books in, everyone suddenly became an expert on library organization. I told one of the administrators how we were going to organize the books, and three minutes later he stopped me to give me a mini lecture on what we should do...repeating word for word what I'd just said. I imagine that if it continues, the advice will get annoying, but right now it's just showing how excited and into the project they are, and how ready they are to run it correctly when I leave.


- Tissu Invite! My friend GbloGblo came to my house to see if I wanted to buy matching tissu with her family for their upcoming party. I guess that's not a huge deal, but she's inviting mainly her good friends to do so, so it's one of those little victories that I love. I'm one of them, y'all!

- Breaking News 3.1- I just got kicked out of school for the day. Not just me, I mean, all of the teachers who were still teaching classes. The permanent teachers who are striking are now increasing the pressure on the government by closing schools entirely for part of the week. In my school, there are now no classes Monday through Thursday, which is unfortunately all of the days I teach... So until this strike is over, no classes for my kids. I was in the middle of class today when the professors arrived to tell me, and when I told the kids to go home, like 12 of them surrounded me to ask if I could please please please do makeup classes. :( I'll try, but finding a classroom on Friday or Saturday will be tough. They're so worried about exams... Sigh. No comment. At least I'm still allowed to do girls' club. This afternoon: Sex Ed, Part 1: Puberty and Periods.

*Later* Sex Ed Part 1 went so well! The girls had lots of questions and were really happy to have things explained. We're even going to do an extra girls' club on Monday, just because we can. :)