We're teaching English...for Livelihood

Since last time I wrote training has gotten a lot more interesting. We've started getting out of the classroom and visiting schools. It's been great to break up the monotony of sitting in one classroom all day at the Centro Cultural Colombo Americano, where the most exciting thing we experience all day are iguana sitings. Actually, I really like seeing the iguanas. I don't think I'll ever get bored of that.

Last week was Bilingualism Week here in Barranquilla and we visited a couple schools for a cultural exchange. Maybe I should start by giving you some background as to why Peace Corps is here in Colombia. The former President of Colombia, Alvaro Uribe, passed a law called "Plan Nacional de Biliguismo", which sets the goal of converting all public schools in Colombia to be fully bilingual in instruction by 2019. Considering that the vast majority of English teachers struggle with English themselves, this is an ambitious goal. Nevertheless, the fact that Colombia recognizes the need to teach its youth the global language is a step in the right direction. By the request of the Colombian government, Peace Corps has returned after a 20 year absence to help with this initiative. All the volunteers in Colombia, including myself, are "TEL" (Teaching English for Livelihood) volunteers and will train teachers in public schools in lesson planning, TEFL techniques, and helping them with their language skills as well. The Department of Education put on its 3rd (??) Bilingualism Week to promote bilingualism and 'reward' schools that were taking steps towards bilingual education. A few schools were selected to receive volunteers and take part in a cultural exchange. We prepared a short presentation, answered questions, and they showed us typical Colombian dances, food, and told us all about their famous carnival. For those of you who don't know, Barranquilla's carnival is considered the best carnival in the world after Rio's, of course. It was an amazing experience and I was so happy to finally be able to visit a school and witness the steps being taken to improving foreign language instruction in Colombia.


"Girls dancing cumbia at Javier Sanchez"

"Halls at Pies Descalzos"

"Shakira mural. Note: all the lip stick marks on her neck."
This week all the volunteers were paired up with a response volunteer so we could shadow them for a day and get a taste of what out lives will be like for the next two years. Volunteers are placed in Cartagena, Santa Marta and here in Barranquilla. Most everyone wants to be placed in Santa Marta with its pristine beaches or Cartagena, known for it's romantic colonial Spanish town. Barranquilla is an industrial port, not very attractive, and far from the beach. We played a fun little game similar to deal or no deal to reveal where we'd be sent this week (except for there was no deal to be made…). I was lucky enough to be chosen to… stay here in BARRANQUILLA! At first I was really disappointed, but so far it's been great. I was assigned to Pies Descalzos, which is a public school built by Shakira and it is incredible. It's a beautiful school located in La Playa, which is a town outside of Barranquilla that is very poor. It's amazing to see such a state of the art facility with so many resources built for children who would have otherwise been given very little opportunity. I'm glad I was able to stay in Barranquilla because I'm getting over a cold and was able to acquaint myself more with the city. I feel like I have a better lay of the land and was able to explore the crazy bus system. I also found out from one of the response volunteers here in BAQ that there are indoor pools here in Barranquilla -- something my host family insisted did not exist -- so that pretty much made my week.

Pretty excited for the weekend because we are going to a music festival (from what I understand) and then heading to a salsa club. Pray I don't make a fool of myself like I did last time. At least I'll have other gringos on hand to share the humiliation with this time around.

Miss you!

Carla