My work and the Education system in Belize

Before you read this: The following reflection is thoughts of mine that have developed over the past few days and weeks from some of the facts I have learned and what I have seen. By no means is what I have said a complete reality of the situation, but instead some preliminary questions I have posed as I begin my work here. If you read all this and have any thoughts or comments, I would appreciate it.

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Working alongside the Director of Catholic Schools (strongest schools) in the Toledo district, I have become exposed to some of the realities of education in this country, which is actually much stronger than most of its neighboring countries. The amount of teachers and whether or not they have a principal is contingent on the number of students in the school. In order to have a principal, other than a principal-teacher, the school must have at least 225 students. There is about a 25:1 teacher to student ratio. The number of students in the school decides how teachers the government of Belize will pay in that school. 100 students would pay four teachers. Since many levels do not have many students they are clustered together with other levels. There are often three grade levels together with one teacher. I can only imagine how it is for an eleven year old to be in a class with a bunch of eight year olds.

So why aren’t schools clustered with other villages, giving each grade enough students for their own teacher? Politicians have proposed ideas like this, but the villages refused. The villagers feel that in order to be a credible village they need a school. Belize revolves around school and children. I guess that is because over 50% of the population is under the age of twenty.

This village pride and credibility is a challenge I will be faced with in working with church services and especially the sacraments. There are only three Catholic priests in the Toledo district and there are thirty primary Catholic schools. They obviously can’t get to every village each weekend. For confirmation and other sacraments there have been strong uprises when the bishop cannot visit every village to celebrate the sacrament. Villages have been known to refuse going to go to other villages and instead have their children wait out the sacrament till the following year in hopes that the bishop will come. This is an issue I will surely find myself in.

The school system in Belize requires students to attend school through Standard Six of primary school, which is till about 12 or 13 years old. After that, to attend one of the two high schools in the Toledo district, you must score over 50% on your entrance exam and pay $400 per year for text books. Therefore, many of the villages have a small amount of students attending high school, in some cases only one! Due to the costs of school, the entrance exam, the 2-3 hour commute each day, and/or other reasons, most people in the villages are not educated beyond primary school, again around 12 to 13 years old. The rest work on the farm, help sustain their family, or get married and have children at ages as young as 14 and 15 years old.

Many who do go on to high school are influenced heavily by western values and material obsessions. One extreme example is the gangs, Bloods and Crypts, who have become prevalent in one of the largest Maya villages, San Antonio. In Belize City, The National Guard has been called because the head of one of the gangs was shot and killed yesterday and they are expecting retaliation.

So the students receiving an education are being influenced to get themselves out and learn how to survive in the ever increasing cosmopolitan world. Many though are being infiltrated by some of the most negatives aspect of mainstream American pop culture. Laving their village increases exposure to other ways of life and influences many to adopt new ideas and icons. Trying to compensate between surviving in the mainstream culture and maintaining village and family values is very daunting for young people today. Not being able to adapt back to the traditional village life and accept the poverty, in comparison to the towns and cities, numerous issues and struggles have evolved.

Education is increasing throughout the district, teachers are improving, curriculum's are being enhanced, and students are excelling. However jobs remain few and far between. There are a larger number of young, educated people without structures in place to employ them and who do not want to work a demanding life of manual labor on the farm just to feed their families.

What is it these people need in a time of exponential depletion of the culture and traditional values? What is education doing to and for them? Is education just westernizing the children in the villages and trying to motivate them to make it to the next level and leave their villages? Then most find out that they can’t pass the test, can’t pay the $400 for books or need to stay home to help their parents. Is educating the children in Maya villages an enculturation into western society? Maybe but I believe that education is empowerment.

What business do I have being here and especially directing religious programs in their villages? For now I am here to listen and learn to what they feel is important to maintain their ways and live a decent lifestyle. As traditions and rituals are very important in the Maya culture, the Catholic sacraments are also very important for their children to complete, which I will be assisting in the preparation of. As I begin riding my motorcycle to the villages and staying overnight, I hope to experience the love and happiness that God has blessed these people with. I do not know where this will lead me and to what degree I will effect the people I work with. But being there, I hope to be a model and inspiration to the people, as I’m sure they will be for me, as we all work to make a more just life for the people in Belize.

Thoughts as I shopped at the market

This morning I woke up before 7am to go to the market, which is about a two minute walk down Front Street, the street my house is on which runs along the bay. As I was about to walk out my door to the market two Maya girls appeared at my side door selling yellow plantains - three for a Belize dollar or 50 US cents. It was the first time I have seen anyone try to sell something at my door and since I have not eaten one plantain since I’ve been here, it was kind of a coincidence. So I guess plantains it would be tonight for dinner. They turned out quite tasty!

As I walked the stretch of vendors, surveying the options that I needed to complete my black bean salad and fried plantains, I saw the Peace Corps volunteer who I met the day prior in one of the villages. He was showing off his Ke’kchi language skills to the Maya vendors which he had acquired from the six week language immersion program the Peace Corps volunteers received in the countries capital, Belmopan, as part of their orientation. That would have been good to have this language immersion but since I will be working in both Ke’kchi and Mopan Maya villages, which are totally different languages, and Creole being spoken throughout the country and especially in Punta Gorda it does not make much sense to dive into just one language. So I am dabbling with all three of these languages, while trying to maintain and progress my Spanish skills.

I shopped around, asking some prices and checking out the quality of the veggies. I ended up buying a two lb bag of black beans, onions, tomatoes, green peppers, an avocado, and a cucumber. Rob, the Peace Corps volunteer, walked alongside me and shared with me how envious he was that I live a stones throw away from the market. He has to wake up at 3 am to get the bus into town. I asked him the time of day and was relieved to find out I had about an hour till 8:30, when I try to be at the rectory for work. I invited him back to my house for a cup of coffee and some fresh banana bread my roommate Susannah back the day before.

He was in awe of my rustic-paint less-crooked- wooden house, our book collection, and of course by beloved peanut butter (I have come to appreciate peanut butter more than anything else, seriously). Rob is living with a Maya family in one of the villages where I will be visiting and working with the school. He shared his struggles and nervousness that he has unexpectedly been faced with over the past week of living in a remote village still in search of his purpose and objective there. He is living with a family in a thatch hut with no electricity and he has no clear cut job beyond trying to improve health awareness in the village, a task that would be asking them to change many of their cultural practices. For example one health issue, from the western perspective, is the food preparation. Yeah it’s probably unsanitary to have chickens and pigs running through the same place where you cook and eat, but that’s how its done and has been done long before any white man reached this continent.

Talking to Rob about his setup really made me appreciate my program. At times I wish I was living with local people and not with three other Americans. However, living in community here allows me to let me guard down at the end of the day and reflect with the other volunteers who have faced very different yet connected experiences and struggles throughout the day. Although I’m sure I’ll face obstacles and struggles throughout my time here, I’m very positive and excited about my setup here and what these two years will hold for me.

On my way to work I saw another Peace Corps middle age fellow who is doing it with his wife. Well not doing it with his wife, but volunteering with Peace Corps along with his wife. I guess it’s quite common for married couple to do Peace Corps together. He’s a counselor in a few of the schools and his wife is teaching. Doing Peace Corps wife your spouse seems like a pretty awesome thing to do.

First motorcycle ride

On Friday I got out on my motorcycle for the first time. We had to take it into the mechanic to get tuned up but after that it was good to go. Jerking the throttle and flying down Main Street made all my anticipation a reality, and this is only the beginning. It still needs to get licensed but after that, I'll be out in the villages as much as time allows.
"The social values are right only if the individual values are right. The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there. Other people can talk about how to expand the destiny of mankind. I just want to talk about how to fix a motorcycle. I think that what I have to say has more lasting value."
-- Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Hurricane has passed

After expecting the worst and staying the night in the rectory, Hurricane Dean passed north of us and was no more that any other storm we get here on any other night. However it is just a preview for what we may face in the coming months. Anyway thanks for all the thoughts and concerns you all had. It was cool that Belize made the news, although all the new channels seemed to really cared about was Cancun and the possibility of it affecting the US. That was real comforting. Oh and its also quite interesting how the news stations loves glorifying the storm by encouraging people to send in their footage, hence encouraging people to attempt acquiring the footage and also having the news casters standing next to the sea with hair blowing about. Yeah it was interesting to say the least watching the US news portray the hurricane when I was watching it come towards me on the satellite. It reminded me of the Jack Johnson song that goes, "Why dont the newscasters care about people who die....".

Done with orientation

I have just completed the two week
orientation in Belize and will be beginning my work this week.
Over the past two weeks I have been able to learn about and experience
much of the diversity that Belize has, both in its people and in the
land.  I have visited a few of the Maya villages that I will be doing
my work in, one of which I stayed with a family for three days.  Last
week the other volunteers (six from Belize City and three in Punta
Gorda) and I put on a summer camp for the kids here in Punta Gorda.
The hot and sometimes overwhelming days ended sucessfully and fun was
had by all.  There was nothing to complain about at the end of the day
when we could walk across the road and jump into the Bay that looks
out the of Guatemala and Honduras.
   Now I am settling in and getting use to my home here in Punta Gorda
for the next two years.  The diversity in people and going by
motorcyle to Maya villages is an anthropolists dream come true.  In
Punta Gorda there are Creoles, Garifunas, Mayas, East Indians,
Mestizos, and a few white ex-pats and tourists.  Many of these ethnic
groups have mixed together making it difficult at times to identify
what ethnicity a person is.  But it doesn't matter all that much
because the people here really seem to get along and live together in
peace with limited racism and discrimination. It is a beautiful thing
that people can get along and live/work together despite
theirdifferent lineages and skin colors.  However the flip side to
that is many of the traditional cultures are losing there ways due to
all the mixing and the influence of the US.
  Anyway I am very excited to start working tomorrow and start getting
out on my motorcycle!
  Lets remeber all those being effected by Hurricane Dean right now
and all the other natural disasters in the world.  It is supposed to
just hit the north of Belize, but quite probabaly will change
direction. We will go more inland if it comes this way.

In Belize!

Hello! After two weeks of orientation in Maryland and one week of phase two orientation in Belize City, including a two day retreat at a riverside lodge, I arrived in Punta Gorda! And it is all its been played up to be and more. My house is right on the Honduran Bay where I can see Guatemala and Honduras off in the distance. Punta Gorda, with around 5,000 people, is composed on Mayans, Mestizos (Europe and Indian), Garifuna’s (African and Caribbean), Creoles (African and European), East Indians, Chinese, and some white priests and volunteers.
Tomorrow I will be going out to one of the Mayan villages to stay with a family for four days to orient myself with village life that I will soon be riding my motorcycle to and doing work in. Next week, the six Belize City Jesuit Volunteers will be coming down here and we will be running a three day summer camp for the children before school starts.
It is so amazing to finally be here and call this home for the next two years. My community members are really cool and we have a perfect location. My house isn’t the prettiest from the outside, but it has so much character and comfort on the inside and the location and view is priceless.