 |
| Gates to my school |
Huruta Primary is a hub
school in a cluster. Cluster schools are supposed to help each other
out, but I don't see a whole lot of that. With eight schools, my
cluster isn't the largest I've heard of, but it's certainly on the
large side. Truthfully, I've only even been to Huruta Primary, the
others aren't in the city limits. Some of the are tiny, 16 students,
so I'm sure they're out in a rural village that I wouldn't even be
able to get a bus too.
I'm totally just going to
focus my work on Huruta Primary.
Which is going to be
handful.
The school recently, as in
the past five years, expanded from a cycle 1 school to include cycle
2. Cycle 1 is grades 1-4, cycle 2 is grades 5-8. There are over 3000
students, and there aren't nearly enough classrooms for them all so
students and teachers only come for half days. The morning shift goes
from 8 to 12:15, the afternoon shift from 12:30 to 4:45. Every month
(Ethiopian calender, not Western) the shifts switch. So grade 1 first
came in the morning, then switched to the afternoon, and then
switched back to the morning.
The school does have some
nice amenities – a special needs classroom (the deaf
kindergartners are adorable. Special need students here include the
deaf, the blind, and the mentally challenged), a library with a
better selection of books than the public library, a science lab
(which I haven't actually seen used), and a resource room (of which
very few teachers use). Personally, I'm a fan of the tea house on
campus, all proceeds go to help orphan students. And it's the
cheapest place in town that I've found so far.
The teachers are nice, and
many know English well enough to have conversations with me. While
not all are interested in what I have to offer, they do like me and
are friendly. I love running into them on the street and have small
conversations outside of school, it makes me feel like I really
belong here. That I'm a community member.
Moments like that can turn a
bad day around.
I haven't trully interacted
with the students yet. They like to stare and touch, and in massive
packs that I find overwhelming so I try to avoid being easily
accessible when they have recces or there is a shift change. The
teachers really help with that, they'll scold students who just hang
on the fence around the teacher building during recesses. The kids in
the states when I were subbing could be unnerving sometimes, I had
two fourth graders start a fight, but here they can be down right terrifying at times. So many faces and bodies, it can make a girl claustrophobic under an open sky.
They are slowly learning the
right way to interact with a ferengi (forgeiner in the local
language). I refuse to answer to 'ferengi ferengi' or 'you you'
(which is usually shouted at me) and turn away from any child asking
for money. As a result, I'm getting yelled at less and kids approach
me with 'hello' or 'good morning'.
And I always get a kick
overhearing kids talking about me and one of them explaining I'm a
teacher. It means they actually pay attention to what I do, and not
just that I'm here.
Things are still rough at
times, but I do like my school. I'm hoping to do all my trainings
there, and include teachers from the other primary school in town,
Boru Qalaxxa which is the hub
school for the other cluster.
