Some of the duties associated with having a registered (home room) class seem a little unusual. Last week, we were asked to determine how many of our students are orphans or have only one living parent. Later that day, I was horrified during my one of my math classes when their registered teacher popped in and surveyed the class. "Stand up if both your parents are dead. Now what are your names?" I tried to be a little subtle about my attempts for personal information. I collected secret survey responses with such questions as "A)What is your name? B)What is your favourite subject? C)What is your favourite sport? D)How many living parents do you have?" One student was away that day, but the following day, he showed up at my desk with his survey responses: "A)Ndamonoghenda Ndalikuvala B)Biology C)Soccer D)One"
This week, a new procedure was implemented. If any of our registered class students wants to drop out of school, they must find us and we will complete the paperwork with them. Teachers are to ask why they wish to drop out. Seems logical...but here's the kicker: if a girl is dropping out due to pregnancy, we are required to determine who the father is and bring them both to the principal (even if the father is not a student at our school). One would think that these tasks would be better left to a social worker rather than to me. The problem, though, is the extreme shortage of social workers in Namibia. In fact, last night I met the ONLY social worker in our region of 100,000 people. Ironically, she is a VSO volunteer from Victoria, BC.
This week, a new procedure was implemented. If any of our registered class students wants to drop out of school, they must find us and we will complete the paperwork with them. Teachers are to ask why they wish to drop out. Seems logical...but here's the kicker: if a girl is dropping out due to pregnancy, we are required to determine who the father is and bring them both to the principal (even if the father is not a student at our school). One would think that these tasks would be better left to a social worker rather than to me. The problem, though, is the extreme shortage of social workers in Namibia. In fact, last night I met the ONLY social worker in our region of 100,000 people. Ironically, she is a VSO volunteer from Victoria, BC.
By the way, here are some of my students with their Science textbooks from Stelly's and Parkland.
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