volunteering for the WorldTeach organization. WorldTeach is an international

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1 Leila Green WorldTeach South Africa Cape Town, South Africa Summer 2013 During the summer of 2013, I spent 9 weeks in Cape Town, South Africa volunteering for the WorldTeach organization. WorldTeach is an international volunteering program that places volunteers in under- resourced schools as teachers. The Cape Town site is 9 weeks long (instead of the typical yearlong program) so our responsibilities were condensed and varied. The interesting part about South Africa is obviously Apartheid; the systematic racial segregation and laws that strictly divided society by intentionally keeping Blacks below Whites in all arenas of society. Having ended Apartheid only in 1994, the nation is still feeling the effects of these policies the Pass Laws that prevented Blacks from entering White areas, the Bantu education that cheated blacks out of a true education and instead only taught them domestic skills, and the creation of informal settlements known as townships and is striving and struggling to recover economically, politically, socially and educationally. My experiences in this country are linked to the gruesome effects of Apartheid, such as the current poverty, miseducation and inequality. Apartheid literally means Apart in Afrikaans, the language of the Afrikaner people who settled into South Africa from Holland and clashed with the English settlers. These people sought to dominate the native Xhosa, Zulu and Sotho peoples and make South Africa a nation for Whites. What ensued was a sort of hyper- colonialism that clearly ranked Whites on top, Coloureds in the middle and Blacks on the bottom. To this day in Cape Town, there is a White area, a Coloured township, and a Black township all within 1.5 miles of each other. The White area, Kommetjie, contains large houses. The Coloured township, Ocean View, exists because of forced resettlement and consists of shacks, tenements and

2 haphazard houses. The Black township, Masiphumelele (or Site 5), is crowded with tin shacks. Upon arriving in this lively country, I was overwhelmed by the need to basically undo Apartheid. Obviously, this could not be done in 9 weeks, nonetheless 20 years. My role became clear after the first week of orientation: I would be tutoring and mentoring teens from Masiphumelele high school; then, I would spend my last 5 weeks working at a Coloured school in a literacy program called Help2Read. The tutoring program was held through IKamvayouth, a youth organization that seeks to provide opportunities for teenagers in three Black townships: Masiphumelele, Nyanga and Makhaza. The Masiphumelele branch held a two- week winter school in a college building. Students in the program attended during their winter break daily, from 8:30AM to 4:00PM. I was told I would merely be tutoring and that students would bring their textbooks and assignments. However, the students (grades 9-12) usually never brought their materials, so I ended up teaching lessons on the fly. The day was divided into 4 sessions: three tutoring sessions and one workshop. I also planned and taught three workshops on photography, business marketing, and racism and segregation. The winter school program was the first time I ever really worked with high school students. These students were mainly Xhosa and all spoke Xhosa as a first language, so it was difficult to relate to the kids at first. Some of them were my age, so I often felt awkward asking them to be quiet or pay attention. In retrospect, I was ill- prepared to work with these kids because I had not yet learned the extent of their realities. I was naïve to their poverty, culture, language skills and ability levels. Despite this, I do believe that I gained

3 immensely from teaching, facilitating, and mentoring these kids because it really taught me how to think on the fly and extend myself to really get out of my comfort zone. I really struggled in the first week to relate to the kids. I never knew what they were talking about and I didn t see how my life experiences related to theirs. By the end of the program, I was able to build rapport with a good number of the kids and I maintained communication with them even after the 2 weeks ended. I also learned valuable classroom management skills; I never thought I could control a classroom of 17 year olds, but I managed. I think this was due to the fact that I was able to cultivate a mutual respect between the kids and myself. Week 3 was spent in a place called The Pink House, a small community center in Masiphumelele that housed a Winter School program for children in grade 6 at Ukhanyo Primary School. Here, I worked with the other volunteers in running the program. There were only about 23 kids and we operated out of a single, small room. The kids journaled, played and did ice breakers for most of the day. It was laidback and not very intensive. This initially concerned me because I was used to the American ideals of structure and efficiency. Those ideas are lacking, if not completely absent, in African culture. Things are done communally and get done a lot slower. While less efficient, I think this way of doing things can be good because it greatly reduces stress and pressure. The children in this program were well behaved and very sweet discipline was never an issue. This surprised me because in America discipline is usually a huge issue, especially among sixth graders. The Xhosa culture, however, holds that elders should always be respected and you should not be harsh or speak out of turn. The Pink House Program was probably my favorite component of my South African experience. I connected really well with the children and formed very close bonds with a couple of them.

4 Weeks 4-9 were spent at Ukhanyo Primary School in Masiphumelele. This school is extremely overcrowded. Classrooms are run out of containers and can consist of 55 students to one teacher. There were few resources for the large student body, as it was the only primary school (Grade K- 7) in the 40,000- person township. Masiphumelele was originally supposed to hold about 10,000 people. Consequently, teachers were burnt- out and poorly trained. Curriculum was ill fitting and not unified. Also, even though 100% of students and staff spoke Xhosa, the children were required to be taught in English starting in 4 th grade. My placement at Ukhanyo came after a bit of a struggle with the site director. He had previously only placed volunteers in the Coloured Township because he said Ukhanyo was dysfunctional and that the kids wouldn t be relatable. Mr. Tyali, the principal of Ukhanyo, had pleaded with Peter for years to place volunteers at his school, but he always refused. I persuaded Peter that I was confident to go to Ukhanyo and after a while he conceded. I wanted more of a challenge and I knew I would not be challenged at the Coloured school because it had more resources and ran more efficiently. My time at Ukhanyo was spent individually tutoring twelve 4 th graders in English reading, speaking and writing. Unbeknownst to me, I became an English teacher, which I had never been before. I prepared a lot of time outside of school making translations between Xhosa and English and trying to determine the best way to teach these kids English. I made worksheets, planned activities and created literacy games. It was a very, very difficult task. I do not think I was totally qualified to teach English to these children because I did not have a firm grasp on their needs. My 12 students ranged in skill from being fluent to only knowing a few words. Sessions were 30 minutes each and I was lucky

5 enough to have a very small room in the library to operate out of. I never worked in a classroom at Ukhanyo, but I think this was for the best. The school did not really understand the volunteer role and wanted me to watch classrooms so that teachers could have extra tea breaks. I politely refused these requests and completed my 6 sessions per day. I also stayed in the library during each recess to read with the kids and took kids after school to do puzzles, read and draw. The Ukhanyo atmosphere was relaxed and laidback, but the language barrier made it difficult to connect to the staff. They basically saw me as a foreigner, and I found it difficult to build rapport with them because they were always very busy and occupied. However, the 4 th grade teachers were very cooperative and understanding when I pulled kids from their class. I think they really appreciated it. At times I felt very isolated at the school because my role was very specified and it was hard to communicate with the teachers and staff. Because I am Black, they would always initially speak to me in Xhosa and I would have to kindly inform them that I didn t speak Xhosa. I think this confused the kids, as well. That was very frustrating. Ukhanyo taught me a lot about curriculum planning and how a school works. I learned there are many components to a school and that they must all be tended to for a school to be successful. Ukhanyo struggled with nutrition, funding, uniforms, class sizes, teacher and curriculum quality, and language instruction. Despite this, the students were lively and resilient. In my spare time I would watch 1 st graders have fights with huge sticks three times their size during recess. This horrified me at first; recess was always unsupervised and the kids basically had a free for all. But over time, I relaxed and realized that these kids knew exactly what they were doing. They re not like American kids, they are

6 much more mature, strong and have an amazing grasp on common sense. The kids were, simply put, amazing. My students were great and I plan to keep in contact with them. I didn t initially think it would be possible due to the high need, but I feel like I did make a positive and noticeable contribution to Masiphumelele. This experience taught me that higher test scores do not always measure your impact you can make a positive impact on a child simply by showing them love and caring for them. I struggled with many of the personal things the kids revealed to me, but I appreciated that they trusted me enough to confide in me. Obviously, I learned way more than I taught. I m not completely sure how effective I was in teaching my primary school students, but now I know exactly what I would do if I had the chance to do it again. I saw most of them improve, but I feel a bit guilty because there were two students with whom I could not quite connect. I wasn t an effective teacher to them because their needs were very high and I wasn t qualified to address them. Yet, I think I was successful at connecting with most of the other teenagers and kids. I began to feel at home in Masiphumelele because I could walk down the street and wave left and right at kids that I knew. When they ran across the street to give me a hug, I realized that I had made some sort of impact on their lives. I think my students will go on with a greater understanding of English, and this will make their time in school a little easier. I will go on knowing that children possess an amazing resilience and that they are capable of anything; I also have a greater understanding of the African continent and the poverty that consumes much of it. I now understand Africa s current condition is a direct result of the many forms of colonialism. Seeing immense mountains, plains and oceans surround the filthy and crowded tin shacks taught me how pervasive and cruel oppression is. Considering my recent return to the United States, I am still not entirely removed from

7 the experience to wholly appreciate it. I think over time, I can understand and comprehend this experience much better. I hope to go back and visit the children one day, and I definitely would like to spend more time in Africa.