Published in The School Administrator journal

In March 2009 I had the honor of having an article about my experience in SA published in The School Administrator, as the feature story for it's issue entitled, "Looking Abroad for Answers".

The School Administrator is AASA's award-winning monthly magazine. It is delivered to every public school superintendent in the United States and provides big-picture perspectives and collegial discussions on a broad range of topics in education, leadership, instructional materials and resources unique to the education community.

August 10-26: Cape Town

August 10-16

August 5-9: Port Elizabeth, East London

August 5-9

August 1-4: Durban

August 1-August 4

July 21-27: Pretoria and Soweto

SA July 21-27

July 18-21 from Pretoria and Limpopo Province

SA July 17-20

Beware

Today we drove to Entabeni Safari Conservancy, a private game reserve. Our accommodations are spectacular. It feels like the Africa we’ve all seen in the movies - thatched hut roofs on the buildings, zebra skin rugs about, monkeys frolicking around. The conservancy sits at the feet of Mount Entabeni, which means “face of the mountain”, in the Africa bush on land that was once home to the koisan and the stage for brutal wars. Noelle, one of the rangers who happens to be from New Hampshire, explained as she drove us in to be ware because all of Africa’s Big 5 (the five most difficult to hunt animals – elephant, lion, leopard, buffalo, and hippo) are on the grounds and roam freely. We are reminded to make ourselves big if we encounter a lion and small if we run into a leopard. She also is kind enough to tell us that hippos are responsible for the most human deaths on the African continent of all animals, and that they come on land at night to graze. Sure enough that night as I slept, I was awakened to a grunting sound. Once I realized that it wasn’t a dream, I looked out of the window of my room where the fire in the fireplace was all but burned out to see a hippos rear-end. I like to think that he tucked me in that night.
On the morning of the 20th we met with a group of teachers and administrators from Limpopo – a more rural area of South Africa. We talked with them about the challenges they face. Again the discussion seemed to turn to the difficulty of language. South Africa has 11 official languages. Under their education policy children have the right to be educated in their mother tongue. While most South Africans know, at least 3 languages, it’s difficult to practicably implement teaching in all of the mother tongue languages when there are so many. Besides, as one of the teachers expresses, the children need English to succeed. I feel saddened that many of the children will lose their heritage and many of the beautiful African languages run the risk of dying which, of course, will erode indigenous culture and customs. It seems some of the teachers were surprised that most all of us felt this way. We reminded them that English is the only official language in the U.S. Our situation isn’t as complicated – or isn’t it. What are we doing to English as a Second Language learners who enter our schools when we, basically, ignore their native language? Aren’t we also contributing to the erosion of their culture and customs? Why when there are numerous studies, including an infamous one done in South Africa that proved the mother-tongue instruction (as a medium) improved student success. Makes sense. Students are better able to understand the content in their own language and, therefore, perform better.
No wonder, the students of Soweto in 1976 protested, in some cases to their demise, against instruction in Afrikaans. Children often know better.