The road lined with cabulas

We are in the last week of our 1^st trimester here in Macomia, and my what a trimester it’s been! I’m currently sitting in the front of a 9^th grade classroom doing “vigilância” for a Physics test, which is what we would call “proctoring,” but here really is more like “vigilance.” The kids in the first few rows are staring at me with daggers in their eyes, waiting for me to stop paying attention for a few precious seconds so they can try to sneak a peek at their cabulas or cheat-sheets.  That’s because they’re the same kinds I caught with cheat-sheets during their History test on Monday, which meant I gave them a 0 on the exam and moved them to the front today to avoid having the same problem again.  They’re not even attempting to just do the test without the cabula, which is incredible to me.  If they spent half the time studying as they did writing cheat-sheets, they might actually do OK.  When proctoring on Monday, I caught a kid showing another kid his cabula for the following test.  Of course I couldn’t give him a zero on the test I proctored because it wasn’t for that test, but I did confiscate the cheat-sheet.  He had the gall to demand that I give it back to him! His reasoning was that it wasn’t for the exam I was proctoring so I had no right to take it.  I told him he had no right to cheat.

Today when I walked up the road to school, I saw that it was lined with an unusual amount of trash.  It almost looked like confetti.  Upon closer examination, I realized that it was just little bits of cabulas that had been torn up and scattered EVERYWHERE.  I guess that’s how you know exams are almost over.

These particular exams are provincial exams, meaning that everyone in the same grade in the province takes the same exam, probably a measure used in-part to prevent corruption in the grading systems at schools and also to make sure all the kids are learning the material set forth in the curricula.  This week classes were suspended so that all turmas of a given grade level can take their test at the same time and the teachers are divided between the rooms to vigilar.  Today I walked into the classroom to a collective groan from the students.  They kept saying “Teacher, you can’t proctor here. Go to a different classroom.” and “Estamos a pedir mudança!” meaning, “we want to change.” Well…good. My work here is done J

Anyway, no more ranting about cheating.   Life here in Macomia has been pretty good as of late.  We’ve gotten into a nice routine and my schedule is much easier because I’m no longer teaching Biology! I am now a professor of Noções de Empreendedorismo, or Notions of Entrepreneurship.  So basically, business!  I’m not going to lie, I really miss Biology.  I was learning so much and had gotten into a nice routine with my classes.  Plus, moving to 9^th grade has been challenging.  But my schedule is certainly easier and while the students don’t take Noções very seriously, I think it’s an important discipline, especially in this province.  Jobs are seriously lacking and until some of this industry gets developed, entrepreneurship is a necessary route for many Mozambicans.  It’s important that they learn some of the basic concepts.  I think it will also present an interesting opportunity to teach some other important life skills.  I plan to host some sort of career fair, talk about job applications, and even doing a personal budgeting project (a skill lacking for even the more educated Mozambicans!).  So we’ll see how all that goes.

The last few weeks have been a bit of a mess because things just keep coming up – changing turmas and subjects, riots in the streets due to a cholera outbreak, cleaning the airport field because the president is coming, no class because it’s Good Friday, two weeks of classes canceled for provincial tests, etc.  In February, a bunch of the Cabo Delgado volunteers came to our site to celebrate my birthday, which was very fun.  It’s nice to be able to share our site with people! We’ve been to Pemba a couple of times for banking and just to enjoy the beach, and we’ve got a pretty nice little system down for traveling there too.  It’s much less stressful now.

Last weekend we attended a meeting for JUNTOS, a program started by PCVs in Mozambique.  It’s a common secondary project for volunteers here.  You get a group of youths together around some sort of an art/performance idea (dance, theater, music, journalism, etc. – even debate!) and spread awareness and information about some of the more serious issues in Mozambique – HIV/AIDS, sexual health, gender equality, domestic violence, etc.  Lots of the Cabo volunteers came here to Macomia for the workshop.  It was very inspiring to participate in the sessions with the Mozambican counterparts. Sometimes the difficulties facing this country seem so pervasive that you start forgetting that you have to start SOMEwhere.  And it’s really nice that there are host country nationals working towards the same goals. Eryn wants to start a group here, and I plan to help as much as possible.  My sitemate, David, wants to start a girls’ group and I’m super down to help him with that.

Well, that’s about it for now.  It’s coming up on time for me to decide whether or not I want to extend.  I haven’t made a firm decision yet, but to be honest it’s hard for me to imagine spending another full year so far from family.  I’ll keep you posted once the decision is made and I know my homecoming date.  Thanks for all the e-mails and facebook comments, etc. etc. Oh, and Happy Easter!