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WEEK of October 24, 2005 |
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A Summer
Abroad in Kenya— by Jeffrey Stanley Like many Brooklyn Friends Upper School students, Colin Cowley decided to use some of his free time this past summer to fulfill his BFS community service requirement. Unlike most of his peers, however, he traveled to Kenya to do so. Cowley, a member of the junior class, made the trip as a participant in a program called Leaders Today, a nonprofit youth organization based in Toronto, Canada. The program offers summer camps that focus on international affairs with an optional travel component. Cowley first attended a Leaders Today camp two summers ago. “It wasn’t my idea,” he confesses. “My mom sent me there. At the time I was kind of mad.” But in retrospect he says the camp was “definitely worth it.” The people he met there were different somehow than the typical New Yorker, he says, and he liked being there. “Everyone seemed genuine, more honest.”
He liked the program so much that his mother didn’t have to twist his arm to make him participate again this past summer, this time as a traveler. He could have chosen a month-long trip to India, China, or Africa, and he chose the latter—Kenya to be precise. Why that trip in particular? “It’s more hands-on. You get to build, you get to teach.” The group spent the first few days in Kenya’s capital of Nairobi but the majority of their stay was in the Masai Mara, a region in southwestern Kenya bordering Tanzania. They helped construct two schoolhouses. They also got to teach in a school already there. The school itself, which covers kindergarten through twelfth grade, consisted of a long and aging wooden building divided into rooms, and four new buildings with concrete foundations and tin roofs. “The old, wooden ones were falling apart,” recalls Cowley. “When the wind blew you could hear it shake.” The students wore uniforms, “but when you get it,” explains Cowley, “you have it for the next four or five years so they’re pretty tattered, and they have no shoes.” Despite these humble surroundings, Cowley found himself surprised at just how much the kids knew. They challenged his assumptions about children in developing countries. “You would think they’d be behind but they know just as much as kids here.” Among other subjects, Cowley and his cohorts taught a number of math lessons to a group of eager fourth graders. “Since you don’t speak the language you have to find other ways. Sometimes you have to act things out.” For a lesson in basic addition and subtraction Cowley and his cohorts counted rocks brought in from the ground just outside the schoolhouse. Although he started out most excited about the building component of the trip, he seems more affected by the teaching element, which was more challenging than he had imagined. “Teaching made you appreciate the teachers here.” Not only did he come away with a newfound appreciation for the work educators must perform every day, he also realized how lucky he is to have teachers at all. “The fact that they are less privileged makes them realize the importance of having a teacher,” he says of his Kenyan students. “They want to learn. It’s not a burden, unlike the way kids here usually see school.” On the last day of teaching the students begging Cowley and his friends to stay. “They wanted to keep learning.” Although Cowley is known around Brooklyn Friends for his drawing talents and intends to pursue a career as a professional film editor, he plans to continue the Leaders Today program next summer to work in another developing country. The entire experience has been life-transforming, according to Cowley “Before, I had only seen New York and maybe some parts of America. Traveling to and living in another country opens you up to so much more.” |
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