As an educator in Boston, I never considered being apart of my students' lives outside of the classroom. I didn't give them my personal cell. phone number, go to any of their parties, and we definitely weren't Facebook friends. The line between my personal and professional lives was straight, easy to see, and hard to cross. Now as an educator in Colombia, the line is slowly disappearing as I shadow the English teacher I am going to be working with for the next year. Gabriel has taught me to dance in the streets with students, go to their graduation parties, buy them snacks when they don't have any money, drive them home when it's late and most of all, make them laugh. Maybe caring about my students is more than important than conjugating the verb "to be?" The people of Cartagena always tell me, "life is short, enjoy it!" So my new plan is to teach my students how to speak English like an American and in turn, they will teach me to love life like a Colombian. Let the line be crossed.
9/26/2010 – 10/15/2010 C1 On September 26, 2010, I arrived along with 8 others to Barranquilla, Colombia to reinstate the United States Peace Corps . We are called Colombia 1 (C1) even though there were many groups before us from 1961- 1981. Peace Corps had to shut down its programs to protect Peace Corps Volunteers’ (PCVs) safety endangered by guerilla warfare and civil unrest. Now, we are back serve to Colombia`s northern coast, but are still proud to be former PCVs from Liberia, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Honduras, Paraguay, and Colombia. Our ages range from 26 to 69 years old. We are all are from different regions of the US and have different ethnicities. One PCV, Carolina, is from Bogota, Colombia, but moved to Florida when she was 17 years old and became a US citizen. Now, she is serving both the US and Colombia. Our oldest PCV, Philip, served in Colombia from 1963- 1965, returned home to be an ESL teacher in the Compton and Watts neighborhoods of Los …
This is something we talk about here at NHCS all time. Building the personal connection with students and families is incredibly important-it helps students know you care about them both inside AND outside of the classroom. (Zach talked about this in his speech at the Gala in October...it was powerful.)
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