Although I have been called teacher all year and am here sharing a western education with Chuukese students, I have been the one being educated. This maybe cliché, but regardless of years, entering Chuuk and the culture here is something that requires crash course education. My students have been my teachers of their culture and humor all year. They have shown me beauty in Chuuk through traditions, care of one another, and they also taught me a lot about patience being a virtue (that I lack more than I thought)!!!! The thing they do not know they taught me though was the true value of education and justice within education through my roll as a teacher.
As the school year ends, I realize I fell in love with my students and my roll in Chuuk. I am not an activist, revolutionary, or radical here. I am unable to stand up and speak in a new culture the way I loved to in the US, but I am able to teach and plant seeds that may grow someday. The roll I play here is as someone working for justice in an unjust system-the system of education. I am able to be a stable teacher who shows up on time, sober, and every day with a lesson to teach.
One time? Sober? Every day? Yes, I said all of those! Lack of education is something I never realized was so unjust until I entered the education system in Chuuk. I saw bad education in inner city public schools in the US, which is true and needs work, but education in Chuuk is something else. Some days teachers do not come to class until 45 minutes into the class, so classes sit and do nothing for most of the class period. Some teachers will get to school late and not teach either of their classes because they were too late and do not want the classes to be in two different places. At some schools (thankfully not mine) teachers show up smelling like alcohol, or worse, actually drunk and “teach.” And sometimes teachers just do not come to school at all. In that case, students sit in their classrooms doing nothing, or walking around school looking into other classes. Depending on the school, this can happen for a day, or for weeks and somehow, these teachers still have jobs.
So my roll here is not to speak up against the horrible education in Chuuk to the Chuukese Government because I do not have the cultural skills or rapport to say anything. I have realized that my roll in education is to speak up at my own school when and if I can be received, and to do my best to teach adolescences each day to the best of my ability.
I used to struggle with the fact that I am not trained in education and do not have a clue what I am doing in the classroom. This though, is not important. All these students need is someone to share their education. They need someone who is willing to share education every day.
So, after finishing my first school year in Chuuk, if people ever ask me what I learned, I know what I would say. Working in this system has taught me my ability as a teacher, but more importantly how much justice is within a good education. Education is something that can never be taken away from anyone. Learning gives people the ability to critically look at the world they live in, to change things in their own countries and communities, and gives to them opportunities that uneducated people do not have. Education is truly a justice. Education is the tool used in nearly everything we do with our lives from reading the newspaper to or jobs to how we raise a family. As for me, I am incredibly thankful for my wonderful education from my parents, Freeburg Grade School, FCHS, SLU, and everywhere else that has educated my mind, heart and soul.
Junior English Skills and Creative Writing student Anthony
