June 18, 2013
When we
announced plans for the YAN internship in late April, most of our students
immediately asked if they could be involved. Knowing that we only had openings
for 7 interns—and also knowing that some of our younger students would probably
struggle with the demands of a 4-week internship spent full-time in an
office—we quickly scrambled to create an alternative internship for those not
selected for the real deal. Our alternative plan finally came to fruition last
Tuesday, when I welcomed 6 of our Form 2 and 3 YAN students from Lycee Molyko
into our house for what I called “YAN-in-a-Day.”
The idea
was for students to brainstorm, plan, create, and edit a video all in one day
on a topic of their choice. Fortuitously, I had discovered the night before
that several 6’x3’ pieces of plywood that have been sitting around our
house—originally sliding doors for our bedroom closets—function really well as
chalkboards. When students arrived Tuesday morning, I had already mapped out on
several boards an agenda for the day, and a set of graphic organizers that
students would fill in themselves in order to plan their video. The prompt I
provided was for students to come up an object or idea that would improve life
in their community, and then create a video pitching their idea. That day, my
students’ brainstorm included ideas like, “build dams to provide power to
communities in case of power failure” (sadly, a very common occurrence here),
and “sell healthcare workers a machine that will detect whether people have
brushed their teeth recently” (my favorite idea). Ultimately, my students went
with an idea to install community-based solar panels to mitigate the effects of
regular power outages. Then, they started using another chalkboard graphic
organizer I had created in order to plan out their video.
By 11:00
am, we started to shoot. Ekema and Shemilove acted out two scenes to
demonstrate how not having light can lead to a thief (played by Ekema) more
easily stealing a wallet from a homeowner (played by Shemilove; the wallet was
provided by yours truly), while having light can prevent such a problem. Abunaw
acted out a scene to demonstrate how using candles in the event of a power
outage can lead to house fires (I created a set-up using a bucket of water for
fire control purposes, and admonished the kids beforehand not to “try this at
home”). Balemba was our photographer. And Besskennie and Elisée wrote and
recorded the voiceover that we then placed over the other students’ videos and
photos. We took a break for spaghetti omelets at lunchtime; contrary to most of
the 13-year olds I know in the U.S., my students waited for each person to be
served, and for a prayer to be said, before eating. And by 3 pm, our video had
been completed. I was impressed, and the kids had a great time—so much so that
I invited them back to my house two days later for another session of
“YAN-in-a-Day.”
Our
second session went just as well as the first—better, perhaps, because I
decided to add some more games to our daily activities. Since school has let
out, Clara and I have been struck by little most students have to do in Buea.
Apart from carrying water and helping with chores, students are mostly left to
their own devices from June to September; and with so few books, games, or
organized activities available, kids pretty much wander around and play in
small groups all summer long. Luckily, we have a small collection of games and young
adult fiction here in the house, so we played a few of the former and read a
few of the latter during our “YAN-in-a- Day” (In fact, a few girls expressed
interest in taking books home, and have since brought them back, eager to take
another. If there is one thing these kids need, it is a good collection of
age-appropriate books!). In any case, it’s been fun running “YAN-in-a-Day,” and
seeing what our kids have learned from us this year, put to practice all in 6
hours—and equally fun to get to know them outside of school, as the people that
they really are.
Posted by Josh.
June 14, 2013
We
are just finishing up week two of the four-week, YAN-sponsored internship
program for local students. So it’s
about time you met the interns!
Lucia
(GHS Buea Town) and Josiane (GHS Buea Town):
Hi, my name
is Nanje Lucia Masare and I’m a student of GHS Buea Town and also a member of
the YAN club. I work with an
organisation called ProClimate International.
This organisation is out to protect the environment from pollution and
also to prot... Continue reading...
Posted by Clara Rowe.
June 10, 2013
In the
morning of Monday, June 3, with summer vacation barely 72 hours begun and YAN
graduation just 48 hours into the past, we welcomed 7 of our students into our
house at Pala Pala field. These students, among the strongest in all of our YAN
classes, hailed from each of the three schools that we teach at. We had
selected them based upon the strength of an application and their work in YAN
classes to participate in the first ever YAN internship, whereby students were
paired with... Continue reading...
Posted by Josh.
June 6, 2013
A Graduation Organised by the YAN fellows in Cameroon,
Southwest Region
“It was on Saturday the 1st of June, 2013
in Buea, precisely in the Buea Council Hall in Buea Town that the graduation of
YAN students took place. It started with
the welcoming of guests and students after which we had some words of prayer
from Sei Stella, a YAN student who schools in Government High School Buea
Town. Then we had an introduction from
Miss Clara, our YAN teacher. After that,
Walters, ... Continue reading...
Posted by Clara.
May 31, 2013
Firstly, a note of apology: we’ve managed to be so
busy in the last few weeks that we haven’t posted a blog for ages. We’re sorry!
But, never fear—we are indeed still here and hard at work. A brief recap of the
activities of the past few weeks:
- At all of our
schools, we’ve closed out our YAN classes for the year! Final classes at
all of our schools was rather hectic, since events at each school at the
end of the school year, combined with a national holiday, combined...
Continue reading...
Posted by Josh Nathan.
May 15, 2013
Throughout classes this year, I have told our
students bits and pieces about life in Costa Rica (where I grew up). Sometimes, I use this as a tactic for getting
their attention—breaking into rapid Spanish achieves instant quiet in the
classroom. Other times, I use Costa Rica
as a point of comparison—when at the health clinic with a group of students
interviewing a nurse about malaria, I explained Costa Rica’s nationalized
health care system (an almost inconceivable... Continue reading...
Posted by Clara Rowe.
May 9, 2013
I’m sitting in my living room at 3 pm on a Thursday afternoon. Classes
have been cancelled here in Cameroon due to Ascension Day, and so with no
school, our Buea Town students have been hanging out in town all day. I did
manage to corral a few of them earlier today to come to our house and do some
YAN work, and so now five of our students are sitting with me around the table,
editing videos on our computers (I coaxed them here with promises of popcorn,
and now Clara is glaring ... Continue reading...
Posted by Josh.
May 2, 2013
Two
weeks ago, I delivered two letters to Principal Ayompe Haddassah in Limbe— the
first was handwritten by one of our students, Nelson, and requested an
appointment to interview her about education for his final video; the second
was from Josh and me, reiterating Nelson’s request in type with the YAN logo
stamped prominently in the upper right-hand corner. We’ve finally figured out the power of an
official looking letter...
Last
week, Nelson and I walked into ... Continue reading...
Posted by Clara Rowe.
April 30, 2013
Back
in January, our students wrote descriptions of ‘how things are done in
Cameroon,’ and then learned how to share these on the YAN Facebook page. You may remember some of the topics—how to
take a taxi, how to buy goods at the market, how to cook a traditional meal,
how to prepare for a soccer game, how the education system works…
The
beauty of these descriptions was that they gave students the opportunity to
write authoritatively about activities they knew, ... Continue reading...
Posted by Clara Rowe.
April 22, 2013
“We
are students at GHS Buea Town, and are here to present a project about water
pollution,” Kennedy said, gazing into the camera 4 feet in front of him and
trying simultaneously to remember his lines but also look like he was reciting
them fluidly and effortlessly. “Water pollution is a major problem in Buea
today. People wash all sorts of things, like cars and clothing, in streams that
run down from the mountain. Then, people who live downstream carry the polluted
... Continue reading...
Posted by Josh.
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