Numbers Shock

The CIA world fact book has to be the single most life changing force in preparation before my journey to Kenya this summer to volunteer at Education for Life. I unlike my other classmates have not found a tremendous amount of self-growth throughout the Beyond Borders program. I also would not say that I have really thought about my travels as intently as my fellow friends in the Beyond Borders program so researching the current landscape in Kenya has been and continues to be interesting and at times challenging to truly think about my journey ahead. Truthfully right now, I am focused on finishing my undergrad degree. I am so done with my undergrad, I am ready for that next challenge and I know Education for Life is going to be the right fit for me.

As much as I know that Education for Life is the right fit for me, I also know its going to be different. Very different. This difference became very apparent when comparing the Canadian and Kenyan economies on the CIA website.

In Kenya, the economy “has been hampered by corruption and by reliance upon several primary goods whose prices have remained low.” Moving to Canada, the description is unrecognizable to the country I will be travelling to. Canada is an “affluent, high-tech industrial society in the trillion-dollar class, Canada resembles the US in its market-oriented economic system pattern of production and affluent living standards.”

The GDP of Canada is over one trillion dollars larger than that of Kenya. The difference is clear when you compare the GDP per capita:

Canada $39 600
Kenya $1600

The numbers do not stop there, unemployment is five times higher in Kenya than it is in Canada while half of the Kenyan population live below the poverty line and 10% of Canadians live below the poverty line. You must also consider the difference between the poverty line in both countries. In Canada, our country is lucky enough to export over $400 billion of supplies each year, just over $10 billion is exported out of Kenya. I understand that money cannot equal happiness but I think the reality is money is nice. Its nice to have money. This way, I can buy things like my tuition, food, and a house. Clearly not everyone has these same opportunities like I do. I had to let the numbers just sit with me because I needed time to think about them and comprehend them. The cost of my Beyond Borders journey is more than the average GDP per capita that someone produces in a year in Kenya. We talked in class about what it is like to go to developing countries and be outsiders to the people who live there. Part of the reason is because they see us as always having more than them and them never being able to achieve our lifestyle. When you start to crunch the numbers, it can be an overwhelming experience. Beyond this it also shows you how lucky you are and the natural benefits you receive just for being born in Canada.

The military between the two countries was interesting to learn about and I learnt more about the Canadian armed forces than I knew before. In Canada, our military branches include the Land Forces Command, Maritime Command, Air Command and Canada Command. Youth can join the military services with parental consent starting at age 17 and reserve and military college applicants can start as young as 16. Canada spends 1.1% of their GDP on the military. Kenya like Canada has an army, navy, and air force. Adults can join the forces at age 18 and must commit to seven to nine years depending on what force they want to become involved in. There are approximately 5 million more people available for manpower in military services than there are in Canada which surprised me a little as well as the fact that 2.8% of the GDP is spent on the military in Kenya. Although the dollar amount is still larger in Canada, it is interesting to learn that a higher percentage point is being assigned to a developing country when the resources could be better spent elsewhere. Perhaps this is for security or because of the corruption in Kenya but even with this information, it is disheartening to learn that resources are being spent in this way.

Diplomacy is important to me and I’ve talked about the power of government before so it is good to know that Kenya has risen to many challenges in foreign diplomacy including in 2005 being a chief mediator in brokering Sudan’s North South Border. Kenya must also work hard to prevent clan vs. militia fighting to pass through the border from Somalia to Kenya and takes in thousands of refugees from Uganda who are escaping the Lord’s Resistance army. Canada does not have the same type of issues but what I identified is the relationship between Canada and the US. Although there are disagreements and issues like trade, security between the two countries acts in cooperation for the most part and both countries are lucky to have a mutual relationship with one another. In the continent of Africa, there is a lot of unrest and a lot of isolated issues that make it hard for countries to work in cooperation with one another. Kenya is challenged and hard pressed to find a cohesive relationship with Somalia because of the unrest. The relationships are not the same and unfortunately make it worse off for countries to work together in cooperation and understanding.

The facts and figures do not lie but I know that money is not everything. It doesn’t take much to effect change. This is what I love about Education for Life and their holistic approach to HIV/AIDS. I look forward to seeing how this organization works and the work they do with limited resources. I think its easy to get caught up in your own life as is but when you are able to reach beyond your natural borders and break beyond them (Beyond Borders, Get it?) you truly learn more then you might ever thought imaginable. I believe this to be true and I look forward to learning more about this in the summer.

For More information:
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/

The Basics on Kenya

"The relationship between culture and development should be clarified and deepened in constructive and practical ways."

—from Our Creative Diversity: The UN World Commisssionon on Culture and Development Report


Kenya is an African country bordering the Indian Ocean between Somalia and Tanzania. At 580 367 sq. km., it is 17 times smaller than the size of Canada. Kenya has approximately 7 million more people compared to Canada at 40 million. Most striking is the structure of the population. In Canada 15.2% of people are over the age of 65 compared to only 2.6% in Kenya. Canada’s median age is 40.7 years while Kenya is less than half that at 18.8 years. This means that my fellow travelers and I would have already lived half of our lives if we grew up in Kenya. These statistics are attributed to the excess of mortality in terms of AIDS which can lower life expectancy, create a higher infant mortality and higher death rates. The real difference between the two countries can be seen most drastically in life expectant. Canadians have the ability to live into their eighties while in Kenya, a birthday past sixty can be pretty remarkable. Urbanization is extremely large in Kenya where 81% of the population lives in an urbanized setting compared to only 22% of Canadians. My largest interest is in education and in Kenya I will be teaching and designing curriculum to improve reading, writing and math skills. Comparing the education levels in Canada and Kenya, you can see grave differences in how boys and girls are raised and brought up. In Canada, school life expectancy is placed at 17 years and 99% of people aged 15 and over can read and write and 4.9% of the GDP is spent on education. In Kenya 7% of the GDP is spent on education. Dollar wise this is still less than Canada because Canada has a stronger economy and unfortunately does not yield as good of results where only 85% of the population over the age of 15 can read and write and school life expectancy is 10 years. It is unfortunate to know that the standards of education are not equal around the world and some countries are not progressing to a standard that seems acceptable. Universal Education should be a right and not all children around the world have that opportunity or world view.

Government is another fascination to me. I truly believe in the transformative power of government to effect change and believe in the process. Some might call this naïve, others might say its not strong enough but government is another area I was really interested to learn about. Both Canada and Kenya derive from the United Kingdom. Kenya’s date of independence December 12, 1963 is a little over 1000 years shy of Canada’s July 1st, 1867 anniversary. In Kenya, a president is elected by popular vote for a five year term and is eligible for a second term. In order to avoid a run off vote, candidates must win at least 25% of the vote in at least five of Kenya’s sever provinces. In Canada our head of state is the monarchy of England, a hereditary family model. When Queen Elizabeth is not in Canada, the governor general acts as our head of state and is appointed by the monarch on advice of the Prime Minister of Canada. The Governor General will designate a Prime Minister to govern. The Prime Minister is usually the leader of the majority party in the House of Commons or the leader of the majority coalition. Canada’s MP’s including the Prime Minister are elected by the people for a term of office. Political pressure groups are common in any form of government. Lets see if you can guess which groups belong to which country:

Group A:
Council of Islamic Preachers, Human Rights Commission, Muslim Human Rights Forum, National Convention Executive Council (Pro-reform coalition of political parties and nongovernment organizations), the Roman Catholic Church

Group B: Agriculture Sector, automobile industry, business groups, chemical industry, commercial banks, communications sector, energy sector, environmentalists, public administration groups, steel industry and trade unions.

Group A belongs to the pressure groups in Kenya while Group B belongs to the pressure groups in Canada. I hope to be able to find literature from these groups when I am in Nairobi just to learn about why they are interested in government affairs and what they are trying to accomplish. It is easier to understand what pressure groups are doing in Canada because it affects our trade laws and our industries and because we’ve had a lot of elections in the past couple of years; there have been a lot of town halls and media coverage about these groups.

Well I’ve covered lessons in Geography, Government and People. I’ve given you the basics. Some of you might be asking why I chose to compare Canada and Kenya. I think in a program where I am actively learning about another culture and another way of life; it is paramount to emerge myself in Kenyan life but I think its just as important to recognize the vast cross cultural differences between my home and host countries. In Canada, we have it good. Our quality of life is more than just a number its comfortable. Learning about that comfort, why it is comfortable and the agents of change that keep it comfortable is just as important to learning why I am going to be uncomfortable in Kenya at Education for life. Well my next lesson plan will hopefully touch on the economy, language, military and transnational issues. I would also like to do a case study on AIDS and the slums as some of my fellow Kenya bound Beyond Borders pals have written about.

For More information:

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/

Literature from Kenya, Learning is my language

The problem with “Cry the Beloved Country” by Alan Paton is that it was written over 60 years ago. These are the words that were uttered to me as I explained what it is like being in an international service-learning program. These might not have been the exact words, it could have been a completely different book but Paton’s “Cry the Beloved Country” is the book that I had to read while in Beyond Borders. It is a very worthwhile read that garners the spirit of social protest through its depiction of apartheid in Johannesburg. But the distinct imagery of apartheid is not necessarily in the social conscious of those that live in Johannesburg today. It is with this thought and suggestion that I researched Kenyan authors and found a little gem in the University of Guelph Library, “A is for Ancestors: Selection of Works from the Caine Prize for African Writing.”

The Caine prize celebrates short stories by African writers published in English. Stories may also be translated into English. What unique is not only is their a $15 000 prize and travel grants for short listed candidates but there is also opportunities for winners and members of the short list to provide workshops in writing across Africa. I quickly searched through the Table of Contents to find writers from Kenya and came across, “The Testimony of Terremoto” by Yvonne Adhiambo-Owuor and “Drones” by Parseleo Kantai. Both pieces evoked imagery and awakened my imagination in different way to what Kenya is present day.

Adhiambo-Owuor’s “The Testimony of Terremoto” is about the trial of Colonel A. Smith, an alleged terrorist in Justice Ongengo’s court room. Both characters are presented as having varying levels of influence and power, Ongengo for being an educated person and Smith for having access to and supply of weapons of mass destruction. The trial garnered great press and the disappearance of both the witness Terremoto and Ongengo disband the trial and Smith is a free man. The writing gave a sample of an educated Kenya where success can happen and where people can and are influenced by terrorism. There is no picture of desolates or poverty; instead grander images of social protest in the form of WMD. It is a timely story in many ways because it reminds us of an ever changing continent. An African has since been named Secretary General of the United Nations and almost a quarter of the world’s exports now come from Africa. In so many ways, you can see growth but the image of a needy, poverty stricken place is still prevalent. I can’t wait to meet George, our site supervisor at Education for Life Kenya, the few emails that have been exchanged are the nicest emails I’ve ever received in my life. I’m bringing up George because I envision him to be someone who is well educated and is able to keep Education for Life going in Kenya much like Justice Ongengo who represented equality and justice.

In “Drones” by Parseleo Kantai, various images stirred within me including what some would call the most vivid image of street kids, “I spent morning talking and taking photographs of the street kids that live on its banks. It has acted as a form of insurance ever since, unlike most people, I have no fear of being attacked, robbed or raped by them.” In this same image the street children also have bags of garbage flung over their backs clinging to it because its their only possession. Some of you readers might be expecting me to now say I’m scared of these children and of this image but the image is more a humbling and accepting image. The photographer who is witness to these children accepts and sees these kids as just that- kids. He has moved beyond being afraid of them or dismissing them because they are “dirty” or “tainted” and has accepted them as children. All of my fellow travelers have been warned to watch out for children thieves because they are the ones you are least likely to expect. It is not that these children are bad, Joanne often describes but it is that they will always see you as having more than they do in any circumstance. I don’t want to describe these children as unwanted but it is the only word that comes to mind. I see these children as needing the most and street kids especially being cast off need the most support in any culture or society.

It was truly a pleasure to get the chance to sink my teeth into some Kenyan literature. There were two other stories from Kenyan writers including “A Turn in the West” by Andiah Kisia and “The IOU” by Stanley Gazemba. Gazemba has written a book that I desperately want to read because his short story was simply one of the best pieces of short fiction I have ever read. It was difficult at first to find literature not produced in North America but it was so worth it, not just because I am travelling to Kenya this summer but also because reading literature opens up a world of possibilities. I encourage you to open your mind to a book or story you never thought you would read.

For More information:

Elam, Nick (administrator) A is for Ancestors: Selection of Works from the Caine Prize for African Writing. Bellevue: Jacana Publishing, 2004.

http://www.eflkenya.org/

The Path is Clear

“In 1994 approximately 800,000 Tutsis and Hutu moderates were hacked to death in a carefully organized program of genocide. It continues to be a controversial event because of the apparent indifference of the international community to the plight of the Tutsi.”
Unknown

"If the pictures of tens of thousands of human bodies being gnawed on by dogs do not wake us out of our apathy, I do not know what will." 
Undersecretary-General of the United Nations Kofi Annan in 1994, as quoted in The East Africa 18 March 1996.


When Paul Rusesabagina went to get supplies for his hotel, he was told that a path had been cleared that would safely return him to the Hotel des Mille Colines. In a military society, one would assume that a clear path was safe from soldiers. In 1994 Rwanda, the clear path meant clear of civilians--- Paul Rusesabagina found this out for himself when he drove over hundreds of bodies thinking it was bad road conditions. At this moment I understood the progression of genocide in Rwanda and the international community’s inability to respond effectively to the crisis.

This weekend I took the opportunity to watch Terry George’s Hotel Rwanda and was disturbed by the amount of civil disobedience that ensued. In some of the most horrifying scenes, Rwandans had to see entire families be slashed and sliced, terrorized by local military leaders and brutally beaten and then killed for no reason other than their identity.

Some of the most telling scenes involved Paul, a Hutu and his wife a Tutsis who by some sort of social standard should not have been married or a reporter Jack Daglish (Joaquin Phoenix) who questioned best friends on their identity and found out that they both identified separately as Hutu and Tutsi. The differences between the Hutu’s and the Tutsi’s are irrelevant but make you ponder the reality that these people lived in measuring noses, or the circumference of the face. Also frustrating was the challenge that regular Hutu people had with accepting Tutsi’s and vice versa.

The film evoked strong emotions for me and terrified me to learn the level of apathy the Western world had to the disappearance of human rights. In the preface of this blog, I quoted Kofi Annan who stated “"If the pictures of tens of thousands of human bodies being gnawed on by dogs do not wake us out of our apathy, I do not know what will." This was a reality that absolutely no intervention by the United Nations or any other body was made while 800 000 Tutsi and Hutu sympathizers were killed. In the movie, Colonel Oliver notes that the UN is in Rwanda as peace keepers not peace makers and this was more than true as the UN kept reporting that “acts of genocide” were being committed.

It is in these moments that the international community including countries like Canada and the United States failed the Rwandan people. The United Nations refused to intervene in any meaningful way instead maintained a status quo that allowed Hutu rebels to kill an unknown number to Tutsi people with projections set at at least 800 000 with some numbers higher than one million. I understand that the United Nations is not an international government; involvement in the United Nations means the commitment of countries and governments. I also understand a country’s sovereign right to govern over its people. But something is wrong in the picture when hundreds of thousands of people are being cut up in the streets by a group of rebel soldiers. There is an immediate response that is needed because it is no longer about a government; it is about the individual who has done no crime that is being killed in cultural profiling. Paul Rusesabagina understood the dignity of human life no matter the cultural profile and took in 1200 refugees in his hotel and was their life-line in the period of genocide while the international community wiped their hands clean of any wrong doing. It is more than just wrong, it is shameful especially when governments like China had a choice to cut off supplies of machetes to the Hutu rebels and did nothing or governments in Europe had the ability to cut off supply lines and did nothing.

A UN task force should have been immediately been deployed with commitment from governments across the world to deploy these troops to restore a government and end the genocide instead of letting bodies become dog food. Human rights need to continue to be paramount and the first thing that govern bodies like the United Nations and even greater our diplomacy. What would our world look like if we put families ahead of oil? or resources over trade?

There were many shortcomings in Rwanda even within the Hotel des Mille Colines where workers temporarily refused to work under Ruseasabagina’s leadership because he identified as a Hutu even though they had worked with him for a number of year previously. The international community acted in just the same way as these workers but unlike these workers, they never changed their stance when 10, 100, 100, 100 000, 500 000 or 800 000 humans were killed. We are given a choice to use government in ways to improve society and create innovative change, with this knowledge we can also fall into a regressive state where politics come ahead of human dignity. The latter is ultimately the most dangerous because it kills diversity, openness and love and sends us into chaos, unfortunately too often government chooses chaos over sensibility.


For More information:

Hotel Rwanda. Dir. Terry George. Don Cheadle, Sophie Okonedo and Joaquin Phoenix. Metropolitan Filmexport [France] | MGM/United Artists [United States], 2005. DVD.



Up Next: Thanks to those waiting patiently about my adventures learning Swahili and reading Kenyan literature, my books arrived late from the library--- so I’m looking to write those posts this week.

Thoughts on the Crisis in Egypt

“The fact is that censorship always defeats its own purpose, for it creates, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion.”
~ Henry Steele Commager

One of the post travel destinations that a couple of students in the Beyond Borders program, myself included had thought about was Egypt. Little did we know that on the 25th of January, Egypt would explode into a volatile environment where pro-Mubarak and anti-Mubarak protestors would attack reporters from around the world and scream their messages. Period. Question Mark. Exclamation mark. Why do I not know what punctuation mark to place after the word ‘messages’?

In the vast majority of news sources including CNN, CBS, The Globe and Mail and CBC, the reports have centered around the protestors and their violence as well as getting Mubarak out of Egyptian government. Although these are worthy stories to report and important stories for people to learn about they are very dismissive about the issues or triggering of these protests. For example: Why should Mubarak leave government? Why did the protest happen? What are people protesting? What issues are resonant in Egypt to ignite these strong feelings for Egyptians? Our news and media conglomerates have not necessarily answered these central questions behind the protests.

What I found out at a further scope of the news coverage and clawed my way through websites, new stories is a little bit of the history. Mubarak is running a one party government in Egypt (National Democratic Party) and has since been Egypt’s head of state since 1981 following an assassination attempt. The protests are in response to the failures of the Mubarak government to provide an effective response to police brutality, state of emergency laws, free elections and free speech, high unemployment levels, food price inflation and low minimum wages. Even looking symbolically at the dates explains more about the protests. January 25th, when protests initially erupted is known as the Day of Revolt to coincide with National Police Day. These protests were launched to give more information about police brutality in Egypt.

I have a couple of points about the crisis that has evolved in Egypt for the past two weeks. First, it is irresponsible of our media agents to focus so much on violence of the protests and the attacks that are being launched but using this footage rather than explaining why the people are protesting. The media in the west is taking a strong position on Mubarak leaving government and although I believe this is an opinion that can be clearly articulated; media needs to continue to provide the reasons Mubarak should leave government.

Second, we as consumers of this media should not be so passive. We should know better than to think that western reporters being attacked is not the story and demand more from our those reporters. This is not to dismiss how hard these reporters have been working but to remind ourselves that we cannot be passive in our media intake or consumerism. This passivity has been seen in many recent reports including when US Congresswoman Giffords was shot and no discussion took place on the second amendment as Bill Maher, political pundit reminded us:




I also believe that the world governments must take a tougher stance on the issues that are happening in Egypt. Mona Eltahawy, an analyst and commentator on Arab and Muslim affairs comments on what is needed for Mubarak to leave office and why its important on a human rights issue for him to leave office in an interview with Connect on CBC: http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/News/Featured_Videos/1555003082/ID=1781428975. It is continuously surprising how the west responds to a lack of democracy and real issues. The youth movement that started the riots in the streets of Cairo were trying to send a message to the Mubarak government and it seems as though they have succeeded. I look forward to seeing history unfold.

Another story sparked from the Egyptian protests was that of the Chinese government banning any reports of what is happening in Egypt because of their Communist rule over the people in China. Devastating that some people live under a government where freedom of the press is not alive and where communication can be cut off so quickly. In many ways, the people of the developing world are censored everyday because they do not have adequate information about health, nutrition, and education yet they have the hope and yearning of possibility. I believe it is in these principals that their stories will continue to be told and real success can come just like it is happening in Egypt and how it will happen in other parts of the world.

It is in self-awareness that we grow the most. This reflection better educated me on the crisis in Egypt. I challenge you to learn about an issue you are close with this week and study it in some sort of depth that will make you reach new understanding.



Teaser for my next blog: I was told to read what current people in Kenya are writing about Kenya...I am going to be doing just that and learning Swahili, what a wild ride it is!

For More Information:

Digital Photography Shots. "19 Photos Showing Protests In Egypt." Last modified February 5, 2011. http://dpshots.com/travel-photography/19-photos-showing-protests-in-egypt.html. Accessed February 6, 2011.

Episode 199. Real Time with Bill Maher. Created by Bill Maher. Performed by Bill Maher. Home Box Office. HBO. January 21, 2011.

The CBC news website was vital to my understanding of the Egyptian protests:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/

Life Frustrations

I’m not the first Beyond Borders student to join this bandwagon. Joanne’s most popular mantra has to be ‘If you’re not frustrated you’re not learning.’ Countless Beyond Borders alumni have said time and again that their experiences have affirmed this belief and I myself have just recently had an experience that has made me believe in this mantra. Frustration links in many ways to a problem and when someone gets frustrated enough with a problem they try to find a solution.

In reading Jonathan Kozol’s Amazing Grace, frustration takes prominence in my reaction. A simple issue like broken glass in the playground took up weeks on the Kitchener Waterloo local newscast but in the Bronx, these issues are so common that no one even thinks in depth about it because it is described casually,“Nearby, in the afternoon sun, dozens of children are playing in a playground flecked with broken glass” (Kozol 135). It frustrates me that these issues even exist and that there is a completely different standard of living in two neighbourhoods just eighteen minutes apart. Kozol is determined to prove that segregation and inequality do exist in the classroom and that those in society who are fortunate are also victim to believing everyone gets an equal chance. Jonathan Kozol sums up his entire career thesis with this quotation, “An awful lot of people come to college with this strange idea that there's no longer segregation in America's schools, that our schools are basically equal; neither of these things is true.” The sad part is that I never knew how far inequality reaches but my eyes have and continue to be slowly opened to understand the issues that separate true equality.

Kozol describes many episodic stories including one about theft in which “Kimberly describes a night, a couple weeks before, when she and her brothers thought their house was being robbed. ‘It was late and we were looking at TV. We called the cops. They never came. We called my grandmother. My grandmother came. The police never came. They didn’t come’” (Kozol 33). The story about Kimberly’s Grandmother going to an apartment that the police were afraid to go too spoke volumes to me and frankly is atypical to my life. Children in the community in which I live are taught that the police respond to every call and they really are communities’ protector. When questioned by Kimberly’s grandmother why the police didn’t show up, the responded honestly saying they were afraid. Why if the police are afraid to show up does the state government allow housing units to deteriorate into an already violent drug inhibited neighbourhood? This thought is also on the minds of the people who live in that very neighbourhood.

Kozol boldly states that “Racial segregation, as a governing fact of life in New York City, seldom surfaces in public dialogue about the problems faced by children in poor neighborhoods” (Kozol 147). This should frustrate you; it certainly frustrates me. In a world where we celebrate minorities being elected into high offices and women holding high profile positions, where all students are able to enter university, well that’s just it--- it does not completely exist. Does it? Some students (and unfortunately most of these students are minorities) still do not have the same luxury of having an equal opportunity to do anything they dream of. Kozol paints frustrating pictures in his body of work and it should be frustrating because it is most of all eye opening.

One of things that I want to do in my life is to go down to New York and ride the train that Kozol describes in the first page of his book, Amazing Grace, “The Number 6 train from Manhattan to the South Bronx makes nine stops in the 19 minute ride between East 59th Street and Brook Avenue. When you enter the train, you are in the seventh richest congressional district in the nation. When you leave, you are in the poorest” (Kozol 3). I want to live in these streets and teach in these schools. My greatest hope is that each child is given the opportunity to learn and not learn like the kids in Kozol’s body of work but learn like the kids who grow up to be astronauts, professors, scientists, accountants and politicians or possibly Wendy Kopp who grew up and was passionate about the equality of the classroom that she founded Teach for America. At the age of 21, Kopp raised $2.5 million of start-up funding, hired a skeleton staff, and launched a grass-roots recruitment campaign. During Teach For America's first year in 1990, 500 men and women began teaching in six low-income communities across the country” (www.teachforamerica.org).

We need to desperately remember that investing in these children is of the upmost importance because they are our future and these children can and will make a profound impact if only given the chance. This isn’t meant as a happy ending, it’s meant as a reminder of the impact these programs can have on children, families, and communities and what their lives are like when no one offers an anchor to support these same children, families and communities. I wrote this because of a personal interaction I had working with a student; if I could only say one more thing it would be that circumstances do change, life can be different and you can run that mile if you believe in yourself. I am an optimist- I know anything is possible.

For more information:

Kozol, Jonathan. Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation. New York: Perennial, an Imprint of Harper Collins Publishers, 2000.



www.teachforamerica.org