Re-evaluation of Ursula Le Guin's Story

Last week, those of us going to Uganda met with Krista who went to Uganda last year. We were talking about what we needed to do to prepare, what we should think about, what to be aware of and not be aware of, etc. Afterwards, I walked to the front of DC Library, and all the sudden I wanted to cry. I can't really explain what happened. I am normally very in control of emotions.

I sat down on this circle seat that was oddly placed, and I called my parents. I cried, and told them I just wanted to hear their voice. I started to tell my Dad about all these expenses I didn't realize were there. I didn't think about having to pay for Spring Term fees or shots or the fact that I don't have a sublet so thats four months rent to factor in. I felt crushed by all this money that I owed or would owe. I felt crushed that there was this thing that I wanted to do, and I felt like I couldn't do anymore because of money.

It wasn't just the money that made me feel so overwhelmed. I feel like there is so much I don't know. I'm not prepared. I have work, school, projects, volunteering, friends, and my fish. At the end day, I'm tired. I don't have time or energy to sit down and read my travel book about Uganda. I don't feel like I'm ready to go away to Africa for three months.

Its been making me think about the Ursula Le Guin story. For those who haven't read it, it describes a utopia. People are happy and their lives are prefect. Essentially, the story reveals that this exists by condemning a boy to live in a basement. Le Guin is fairly graphic and describes the boy as fiddling with his genitals and sitting in his own excrement. People go and see the boy. Some people just return to their happy lives and others leave the utopia. In our class, we associated the boy to be the developing world and the people living in the “utopia” to be the developed world.

In the story, it seemed so easy for people to go and see the boy. We assumed that they just had to walk in a basement. But what if the door to the basement is locked with Alien technology? Furthermore, what if to even get to the locked door, you have to go through a maze with money spiders who crawl all over you and suck your blood?

We never considered that maybe people do not go to see the boy because its just really difficult. I don't want to put words in my classmates mouth but I assumed it was just a matter of walking into a house and going downstairs. And I don't know what it was supposed to be in the story, but the real world is not like that.

I've wanted to do to this program since first year. I felt amazing when I found out I was accepted last year. It never occurred to me it would be difficult in the ways that it is. I never thought of the preparation mentally, physically, financially, and emotionally.

My question is can you make the decision to leave the utopia without seeing the boy? I don't want to suggest that I'm backing out of this work placement. However, I understand and am more empathetic to those people who don't want to do something like this. My question is can those people who don't go for legitimate reasons to the developing world, draw the same conclusions as those who do go. Is it possible to live in perspective as we've discussed, if you haven't seen or experienced the developing world?

Thoughts on Volun-tourism and Nicole's Post

I am writing in response to Nicole's post (http://livingbarefootnicole.blogspot.com/2011/02/volun-tourism.html#comments) on volun-tourism. I think that there is merit to what Nicole's professor said. I honestly do not think there is a much of difference between long-term and short-term volun-tourism.

One of Nicole's questions was if she would be damaging to India. I have this concern too for myself, because I think almost all volun-tourism perpetuates a cycle of dependence of the developing country on the organization and developed countries. I think the best way to illustrate this is with an example that I have been thinking about.

There are many programs where people go and teach primary education for a period of three to six months. On the one hand, I really admire these programs. If you had asked me, if a volunteer was helping during their time there, I would have said yes. The volunteer is going to teach children, and give them an education.

However, I started to consider the situation in a larger time frame. Consider a child who every three-six months has a new teacher. The teacher has to take time adjusting and learning their new environment. By the time, the teacher learns the personalities and learning styles of the children in their class, then the teacher leaves. In addition, the teacher has little to no idea of the actual experience of their students.

I question, why aren't local teachers being used? People who can consistently be there, and understand their students. This could be due to lack of infrastructure to train teachers followed by inability to pay teachers. Why aren't we helping the country develop these missing links that would allow them to be independent?

To me, it does not matter if it is short-term or long-term volun-tourism. The model itself is wrong. It seems that all that this model of development does is create a fluctuating learning environment for children and perpetuates a system where there aren't local teachers. Now when you ask me, are those volunteers helping? I am not sure. Are those volunteers damaging the country? Is perpetuating a cycle that makes a group of people dependent damaging?

There are characteristics of this situation that can be extrapolated and avoided:

1. Volunteers are doing a job that a local person could do if there was infrastructure and money.
2. Instead of solving the root of the problem (lack of infrastructure), the organization is dealing with its effects (lack of teachers).

Number 2 to me seems like the biggest problem in development. We are always trying to “help” the aftermath. I think an apt metaphor is in terms of a broken chair. We keep helping up the people who are sitting in the broken chair and falling instead of fixing the broken chair. The Millennium Development Goals are the aftermath of larger problems of corruption and countries who are not providing the services for their citizens. Instead of putting international pressure on governments to behave and take care of the people in terms of aid and loans, we are going in and fixing the effects.

I have digressed somewhat from the original discussion on volun-tourism. I do not know at the present what I think of volun-tourism. I think volun-toursim can help make small differences that matter. I think it is dependent on the situation, organization, and the people involved. One thing we can keep in mind is what Joanne said in our class that we are going their to gain perspective. When we come back, we can adjust our lifestyles from this gained viewpoint.

It is discouraging to have someone criticize something you are doing and believe in. However, if there is merit to what Nicole's professor has said, I do not really think you can change something, until you know how it works. We've been discussing development and reading about international issues, but we don't know the real-world situation. At this moment, this is one of the few mechanisms to discover what international development is like besides moving to a developing country. If we see the problems and recognize them before going over, we can see if there valid. We can see how organizations could develop a different model and understand why the present model exists. What will distinguish our experience as being damaging to a country or not – is what we do with what we have learned.

Expansion of Freire's Analogy of the Current Education System

This past week, I read Lawrence Summer's speech (http://pospapendix.blogspot.com/2008/11/lawrence-h-summers-speech-on-january-14.html) on why women are underrepresented in the higher academic positions in faculties of science and engineering. In addition to this, I had to read a piece supporting Summer's remarks by Stephen Pinker and another debunking Summer's remarks by Jane Spelke. One of Summer and Pinker's arguments is women are underrepresented in science and engineering due to innate biological differences. Spelke unwinds this claim through a series of arguments, and simply states, there is no evidence to suggest that there are biological differences. However, all these professionals noted that men and women learn differently. In the class discussion of these pieces, my group and I started critiquing and complaining about the current education system, and how it does not adequately address students' different strategies of learning. From this discussion, I would like to expand Paulo Freire's metaphor further from Pedagogy of the Oppressed (http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/philosophy/education/freire/freire-2.html) to one of my own, and discuss whether the developed world's model for education should be propagated.

I think our education system (before university and at times even in University) is like a toothpaste factory. The factory takes empty tubes (students) and fills them with the same toothpaste (“knowledge”) in the same way. Then, the tubes are capped because the factory has filled them enough. Finally, every tube is assessed on the same factors that the factory has deemed suitable.

The empty tubes is similar to Freire's that our current education system treats students as empty receptacles that need to be filled. The teacher is an omnipotent being, and the students are, “an empty 'mind' passively open to the reception of deposits of reality from the world outside (Freire 2).”

Additional part of the problem children have different strategies for learning but our current system does not recognize this. Freire states there needs to be dialogues, open conversation, but perhaps, this is not even the best strategy for learning for particular children. I think Freire commits the same harm that he accuses society of. How can we reconcile children's different learning strategies?

Furthermore, we assess students on the same standards. Personally, I agree that there has to be some way to compare people, and a common assessment is the easiest and most efficient way of doing it. However, I think that the assessment needs to ask questions that appeal to these different strategies equally. Spelke suggests why boys tend to do better on the SAT. She suggests that a majority of the SAT questions are framed for the predominantly male strategies of problem solving. When girls are taught to use the other method, girls and boys scores become more equivalent. I find it flabbergasting that the assessment for entrance into higher academic institutions is biased towards the male strategy, but we assess everyone with it. I would just like to be noted that I am not generalizing, and saying that all males tend to use the male strategies and females use the female strategies. There will be variation in the sexes and cultures.

In addition, society only values certain knowledge and skills. The toothpaste tube gets evaluated only on certain components. Is there a drawing section on the SAT or ACT? Is there a philosophy section? We use these tests to evaluate students entrance into higher academic sections, but exclude students who have focused or have strengths in other subjects.

I suppose since I have just lampooned the current education system and compared it to a toothpaste factory, I should suggest an alternative, but I do not know exactly what an alternative would be. My two main suggestions would be the following:

• Small class sizes especially in the early years of education to give the teacher the opportunity to learn the students different learning styles and abilities.
• Create more comprehensive assessments that test a range of skills and can be solved using a variety of learning strategies.

Its difficulty because I feel the system we use is so ingrained in our culture and the way we live that changing it is next to impossible. I strongly feel that current mode of education is detrimental. It leaves out certain people because of the way we assess people and what we consider important.

In terms of development, I am not sure why developing countries should follow our model when it has severe flaws. I think the mold should be broken, and development agencies should consider new methods of teaching. Again, I am stuck on exactly what this would be. United Nations Development Program should rethink grading, subjects, and teaching styles. I recognize that there are limited resources in the developing world, but I feel as though we should be investing our money in a better system instead of the one that we are presently using which excludes and hampers certain students.