January Exams

Well, we've been back in school now for three weeks.  While it's not the way I would do things, the Tanzanian education system puts emphasis on frequent exams, so we use four days a month (at least) for exams.  This week is the first round of exams for this school year, and we're having them at the very end of January so they'll serve for February, too, and we don't have exams again until mid-March. 

My form one students were a bit nervous sitting their first exams of secondary school, but of course they did quite well.  The overall academic level of this class is the highest we've had yet, and we all have high hopes that they will bring a lot of credit to the school in their national exams in forms 2 and 4. 

They all have their new school uniforms now.  The first day I walked into class and they were all wearing their brand-new orange sweaters was rather blinding.  That's a lot of very orangey orange.  Fortunately, after a couple of washes, they tone down at least enough that I don't need sunglasses indoors. 

Sunset on Campus

The late afternoon late turns the campus golden around six in the evening.  One interesting part of living so close to the equator is that sunrise and sunset are about the same time year-round; no short winter days and long summer ones. 

One of the students asked to take some pictures with my phone (they aren't allowed to have phones at school, so they're always eager to do anything whatsoever on anything electronic) and took a photo of me; I don't have many recent photos of myself so I thought I'd post this one.

Selian Hospital (from the outside)

I was in Arusha with Tammy today, and our first stop was to Selian Hospital.  I'm not sure why it's called Selian; its real name is ACMC, Arusha Christian Medical Center (I believe it's associated with the Lutherans).  It's the best in Arusha.

One of my students, Isack, was running in the boys' dormitory the other day and somehow managed to run into the door handle, resulting in a puncture wound in his hand and a broken wrist.  What a way to start out secondary school; he only made it two weeks in before getting injured.  And he's one of the smart ones... :)  He was at the hospital today with his mother and his uncle to see if the broken bone will require surgery.  He was quiet, but seemed to be handling it well.  Please pray that it heals quickly and without too much pain.

Elipendo, who works at the school running the school store, managing school uniforms, and assisting Tammy with various nursing items, stayed with them at the hospital to help as she knows the system well from sitting with other students and community members who've ended up here before. 

Full Wolf Moon

January's full moon was a Full Wolf Moon, with a lunar eclipse the same day.  My mother enjoys things like eclipses and meteor showers and keeps me informed when some such event is imminent, so I made a point to go out and look.  The eclipse was visible in the US, and as such was long since over before it got dark in Tanzania, but the full moon was still huge and bright as it rose over the dining hall.  I wouldn't have been able to see it from the house, so at least it was a bit of silver lining to working late at the school. 

Morning Assembly

Another Monday morning at Alpha Omega Secondary School...I went to morning assembly since I was at school early enough.  The students are arranged by form (grade), and the Head Prefect, Benedict, leads them in a bit of drilling, ordering them to attention and at ease with a few 'about turns' thrown in.  They then sing the National Anthem while the Scouts (some students who are part of a Tanzanian boy-scout-esque group) raise the flag.  I could tell they were rather tired this Monday morning as the song was rather lackluster and mumbled; usually, they are enthusiastic singers. 

After the anthem, one of the teachers or students usually makes a five-minute speech, and Monday is Lewis's day as Headmaster. After that, there are the announcements of the day.

Couchful of Friends

When I sat down on this couch, I was alone and plenty of personal space.  That did not last long.  Good thing they're so cute. :)

Good Times in the Library

The library is becoming a popular hangout spot in the afternoon after classes finish at 3:30.  Students come to read, study, take out text books, use my markers, tape, scissors, etc, and most importantly to them, listen to music.  I have a playlist of songs that I play.  It's a struggle to find songs that they like but that are clean enough to not be frowned upon at a Christian school.  

I hit gold when I found Lecrae, though--he's a Christian rapper whose music is clean with good messages, while not being overtly about religion.  I happened across the song "I'll Find You" last term when I needed an example of rap music for a class activity, and they all were immediately obsessed with it.  That obsession has not ended; I still hear it two or three times a day most days.  I later got his album Let the Trap Say Amen, which has been very popular with the students.  They also really love Charlie Puth's song "One Call Away" and thankfully, we share a taste for Pentatonix.  If any of you know of any pop or rap songs that are clean and enjoyed by teenagers, let me know!  

Salum has taken the roll of 'Keeper of the Speaker' today, and is enjoying himself thoroughly.

Charles saw that I was taken a few pictures and decided to be a ham.

Tuesday in the Library

Tuesday is Form 2's Library Day; during lunch the library is reserved for them to check out books other than text books--fiction or nonfiction, for their own entertainment.  I can't get the students here to call fiction books 'fiction'; they insist on referring to them as story books.  Michela also usually prints out coloring pages, which the students really enjoy.  

School Baraza

This afternoon we had the first school baraza (assembly/meeting) of the year.  We started off with the sutdents singing first the national anthem and then the school song.  The assembly had several items on the agenda.  First, the headmaster and deputy headmaster both welcomed the students and teachers to the new school year and made speeches about their vision for the new year.

Next, we gave out awards for last school year: most improved in each grade, best at cleanliness, the top three students in each class, and all of last year's Form Two students who just got back their results on the national NECTA exam (34 scored division I and 3 scored division II--incredible for a new school, second out of all the schools in our district, and well above the national average!  Monduli district is now 9th in the whole country!).

And then we had the Head Prefect, Benedict, come to address the administration and teachers with the concerns and requests of the students, and went through items from the suggestion box outside the office.  Or, as I called it, The Airing of Grievances.  The students had some good suggestions and some that were really long shots.  Of course, everyone is still a bit frustrated with the new textbook system, but I'm hoping as we get things organized and work out the issues that that will get better.  The girls would really like to be allowed to braid their hair instead of shaving their heads; that got a resounding NO from the headmaster.  (Students of both genders being required to keep their heads shaved is very common here, and we often have water shortages so anything requiring longer showers etc. is probably not a good idea.)   The students would also like more field trips.  Of course, we would love for them to go on more field trips...but field trips gets expensive fast.  Their request for more physics and chemistry practicals (lab time) is already in motion; we have hired several new teachers this term, so we should be able to do more of that this year.  Overall, the meeting went pretty well, and only started late enough and then ran long enough that the students were only about half an hour late for the normal supper time.  (Yes, I'm being rather sarcastic.  Much better than the teachers' meeting the Saturday before classes started--it was scheduled for 9-11:30 am, but actually ran from 11:15 am to 3 pm...).

Mr. Oscar (in the middle), my co-English teacher, with the top students: Regarn, Benedict, Shuaka, Pamela, Moureen, and Mariam.  

Top students for the 2018 School Year:
Form 2: Benedict (who is also the Head Prefect)
Form 1: Shuaka
Form 3: Pamela (the eldest daughter of one of the main families in the Monduli church).

Working in the Library

I finally have the textbook shelves arranged in the library.  I think it looks pretty good; we’ll see how the system works, though.  Although it may sound simple to have students check out textbooks, it’s always a learning process when starting a new system.  Hopefully, over the next few weeks I can keep adjusting until we have a process that works for everyone.  Currently, the plan is for the library to be open from 6:30-7:00 am (between breakfast and morning assembly), 9:30-9:50 (morning break), 12:30-1:30 (lunch, when it has always been open for checking out normal library books anyhow), and from 3:30-4:00 (between classes ending and the beginning of clubs/sports time).  I wanted to have it open in the evening as well, but there is no time in the schedule after dinner and the academic master does not want to adjust times there.  Fortunately, the student workers can handle some of the times—especially the morning one! 

The Students Arrive

And they’re back!  It’s move-in day for the 2019 school year.  Unfortunately, I didn’t get any pictures today, but here’s a photo of some of the students being silly another day. 

This year, I’m co-teaching Form 1 and Form 3 English with Oscar; I’m doing the grammar/pronunciation/speaking/general English, and he’s doing the literature/writing part.  We’ve worked it out where I’ll teach them three days a week and he’ll do the other two (he’s also teaching Kiswahili classes every day, as well as being the teacher in charge of sports).  In addition to teaching, I am taking on the role of librarian. 

Michela, the Short’s teenage daughter, and a few student workers have been managing the library the last couple of years and have done a good job.  However, we are trying a new system of storing all of the textbooks in the library and having students come to check them out as they need them instead of issuing them to the students for the semester.  The students do not have a good track record of taking care of books, and Mr Gerald, the academic master, had heard of other schools doing it this way and thought we could give it a try to see if we can get the books to last longer.  Also, we are expecting a container from the US with some new equipment for the school as well as about 3000 more books for the library (we have less than 500 now); it was originally supposed to have been here by now but has been delayed.  We’re now hoping for April or May; the bookworms among the students ask about it’s progress frequently.  So, between these two major changes to the library, there’s plenty of work for me to do. 

The first tasks today were stamping and inventorying (is that a word?) the first boxes of new books for Form 4 and getting started on organizing all the textbooks and rearranging the shelves to make them easily accessible.  This is more than a one-day job; apparently the teachers forgot about collecting textbooks until the last-minute last term, so everything was just tossed onto tables in the library rather haphazardly.  I’ll post some pictures once I get it looking nice, though!     

So, some new challenges, but I’m ready to get back to work.  Most of the students I taught in preform last term have returned to begin Form 1, and it was good to see them all again.  I’m looking forward to getting to know the Form 3 students better as well.  I’m hoping this will be a good year at Alpha Omega!

New Administration Building is Open!

On the Friday before classes were to start on Monday, the new administration building at the school was officially opened.  Several of the teachers as well as a few students who live nearby and didn’t have anything better to do came to move furniture from the old offices into the new ones.  The new building is really nice; I like the soft orange color that it’s painted inside.  It now houses the school secretary/receptionist, the workroom with the copier, a meeting room, and the offices of the headmaster, deputy headmaster, academic master, discipline master, and school accountant.  There’re still a couple of empty offices, as well, for any future needs. 

The building next door has three main divisions; before this move, the first was the offices, the second was the teacher’s lounge, and the third was the library/computer lab.  Now, we’ve moved the teachers’ desks into the old office space; Lewis plans on removing a temporary wall eventually as we all rather liked having a larger open space, but for now we’ve split up into an English/Kiswahili office (me, Janet, Oscar, and Fibi), a History/Bible/Civics office (Neema, Judika, and Fielden), and a Math/Science office (Godfrey, John, Charles, and Leah).  It’s a bit tight but should do for now.  Then the computers were moved into the old teacher’s lounge room, and the library is finally just a library.  

It was good to be back on campus after the summer break; I’m looking forward to the students returning on Sunday afternoon!