On July 13th, Satyagraha set up a visit to one of the Indian townships for me to talk with a principal of a largely Indian school although mixed with some black students from the nearby black townships. This was an extremely informative visit and I also had the opportunity to “teach” a class. While, normally, students are not in school on a Saturday, all schools in South Africa need to make up time lost during the recent national strike that also included educators. Contrary to American unions, the South African Teachers Union also includes administrators which, I believe, engenders a slightly more collegial environment. The principal of the school is also heavily involved in the union.
The topic of my lesson was migration. Drawing on my own family’s immigrant roots, the students and I discussed the Indian migration to South Africa as well as rural to urban immigration of the indigenous population. Comparisons were drawn between the US and South Africa and to the reasons why people migrate. The students were very engaged asking questions ranging from how I liked South Africa to crime in America. I was also very impressed that the students could ascertain the various conditions affecting migration patterns that range from finding better employment to the desire to be free of political oppression.
The principal and I discussed many things. As a relatively new principal, I was interested in learning more about the mentorship process of administrators. While South Africa has yet to get a formal process off the ground, other than to have administrative certification coursework requirements, the principal in question has spearheaded a local principal consultancy/roundtable, on a monthly basis, with other principals in the Indian townships. In addition to administrative duties, many principals are also expected to teach one/two classes often without the aid of a vice-principal, especially in primary schools with less than 400 students. While the school in question had had a vice-principal, this person had been reassigned by the time of my interview. In the meantime, different teachers have volunteered to assume various department head duties although none of these positions are official.
From my discussion, it was clear that some administrators in South Africa feel that democracy and equality is not coming soon enough. My interview subject, as a former student leader in the ANC during the struggle to end Apartheid who had been jailed, is becoming particularly disillusioned. The national strike echoes some of their concerns. Indeed, having now seen schools in the Black, and Indian townships, as well as former white/Model C schools, it is clear that infrastructure inequities still exist as the Black schools often had no sports fields, the Indian schools had fields of varying quality, and the former model C schools – such as Durban High School – had Olympic size swimming pools and other playing fields often supported with private endowments. It is a tough problem as the SA Department of Education must maintain equal funding to former model C schools which often still receive alumni endowments, rather than instituting a sort-of reverse Apartheid system, while also helping to upgrade school facilities in the townships to an acceptable level. The principal, with whom I spoke, hopes that upgrades will include the integration of technology as it is still often unheard of in township schools. As of now, even with broadband, local phone charges are assessed in South Africa. The school that I visited must make due with an annual budget of only $20,000 US as well as on some yearly subsidies. The school, however, has had academic success which the principal credits to the implementation of a school culture that stresses academic excellence based, in part, on a commitment to values education.
As with American schools, the principal and I shared our concerns and methods by which to foster parent involvement in the school community. Indeed, this has been an “informal” challenge in the school that I visited as the principal must make Black parents feel welcome in a formerly but still largely Indian school and to highlight cultural similarities rather than differences to both students and parents. Principals must also help educate parents, in formerly oppressed communities under the Apartheid regime, to develop leadership capabilities and increase parental self-esteem. There has been some resistance to this because boundaries are no longer understood as they were under Apartheid. The principal also shared with me that it is his desire that the teaching staff also be further integrated. At this point, the teaching staff is completely of Indian descent. We also discussed the possibility of teacher/student exchanges as well as the possibility of his students contacting mine with any questions on America that they might have.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Friday, July 13, 2007
Sugar and Durban: The Growth of the Indian Community
Sugar and South Africa: The Growth of the Indian South African Community
On July 13, 2007, having been in Durban City (Kwazulu-Natal Province), I visited with both Satyagraha, an organization dedicated to promoting the values of Mohatma Gandhi and his principles of non-violence, and the Indian Cultural and Documentation Center.
While South Africans of Indian descent can be found throughout South Africa, many in this community can be found in the Durban area and in the nearby former Indian townships of Chatsworth and Phoenix. Those of South Asian descent were also segregated during the Apartheid era.
During Dutch colonial times, there is some record of Bengal slaves being traded between Batavia (Indonesia) and the Cape Colony (South Africa). However, in the 1800s, the Indian community really began to take hold. Local Zulu inhabitants refused to work on sugar plantations in the area; the key commercial product produced in this sub-tropical region of South Africa. As a result, on November 16, 1860, the first Indian indentured servants, who were expected to serve a five year term on local sugar plantations to pay off transport, arrived from India on the SS Truro. This landing was followed by many others, and, at the end of their service, Indian indentured servants could be transported home to India or could opt to stay in South Africa. Given the poverty in India, many chose to remain in-country - a country that recruiters in India portrayed as “a land of milk and honey”. Indeed, while many Indian South Africans are now prospering in the post Apartheid environment, the history of this community was far from easy or unified.
Indentured servants were treated poorly on plantations often only being given one day to build their first makeshift homes before being expected to work from sunup to sunrise thereafter. Sanitary conditions were also poor. In the1870s, Indian indentured servants were joined by the first passenger Indian immigrants – those able to afford their own passage and who often started their own businesses. While many indentured were of Tamil ancestry, with the arrival of passenger immigrants, the South African Indian community would soon consist of all castes, Hindus and Muslims, and those from the northern regions of India. One of the most famous immigrants to come to South Africa was Mohatma Gandhi.
Having arrived, unknown to the world, in 1893, lawyer Mohatma Gandhi came to represent a legal client in a local dispute. He stayed for over twenty years, and, following an eviction from the train in Pietermaritzburg for being in a “white” train car, Gandhi became politically active in the struggle for racial equality and peaceful resistance in a movement that he called “Satyagraha”. In 1904, Gandhi started his first ashram, or community based on his values and religious contemplation, in Phoenix. This community consisted of a publishing house, a school, and his house. It was from here that Gandhi published the journal “Indian Opinion”, an initial action of protest that would see Gandhi in/out of prison on political charges for many years. It was after this that Gandhi returned to India to lead it towards independence from British rule.
Having visited the remains of the Phoenix settlement, yesterday, I did feel a certain sense of peace as strange as this may seem. While visitors can tour the small reconstructed house, as the first was burned down during Apartheid violence in the 1980s, and the Printing House, there are plans to upgrade the site further to renovate the original school site and to include a museum. A few objects from Gandhi’s time in South Africa, however, can be seen at the Indian Documentation and Cultural Centre in Durban. The staff at the Centre was very helpful in providing the information for this posting and hopes that the Centre will eventually be funded by the national historical commission.
The Satyagraha organization, with whom I also met, was founded by Gandhi’s granddaughter Ela Gandhi, her father having remained in South Africa upon Mohatma Gandhi’s return to India. While the organization remains committed to promoting principles of non-violence, it is finding itself increasingly involved in assisting the Indian community to come to terms with their new democratic freedoms since the fall of Apartheid. It has also become engaged in tolerance education in schools having sponsored essay/writing contests on the importance of democratic principles today. Tomorrow, I am scheduled to meet with a principal of a mostly Indian public school in Phoenix and, following this, I will be meeting with Satyagraha representative Clive Pillay for a tour of the Chatsworth community.
On July 13, 2007, having been in Durban City (Kwazulu-Natal Province), I visited with both Satyagraha, an organization dedicated to promoting the values of Mohatma Gandhi and his principles of non-violence, and the Indian Cultural and Documentation Center.
While South Africans of Indian descent can be found throughout South Africa, many in this community can be found in the Durban area and in the nearby former Indian townships of Chatsworth and Phoenix. Those of South Asian descent were also segregated during the Apartheid era.
During Dutch colonial times, there is some record of Bengal slaves being traded between Batavia (Indonesia) and the Cape Colony (South Africa). However, in the 1800s, the Indian community really began to take hold. Local Zulu inhabitants refused to work on sugar plantations in the area; the key commercial product produced in this sub-tropical region of South Africa. As a result, on November 16, 1860, the first Indian indentured servants, who were expected to serve a five year term on local sugar plantations to pay off transport, arrived from India on the SS Truro. This landing was followed by many others, and, at the end of their service, Indian indentured servants could be transported home to India or could opt to stay in South Africa. Given the poverty in India, many chose to remain in-country - a country that recruiters in India portrayed as “a land of milk and honey”. Indeed, while many Indian South Africans are now prospering in the post Apartheid environment, the history of this community was far from easy or unified.
Indentured servants were treated poorly on plantations often only being given one day to build their first makeshift homes before being expected to work from sunup to sunrise thereafter. Sanitary conditions were also poor. In the1870s, Indian indentured servants were joined by the first passenger Indian immigrants – those able to afford their own passage and who often started their own businesses. While many indentured were of Tamil ancestry, with the arrival of passenger immigrants, the South African Indian community would soon consist of all castes, Hindus and Muslims, and those from the northern regions of India. One of the most famous immigrants to come to South Africa was Mohatma Gandhi.
Having arrived, unknown to the world, in 1893, lawyer Mohatma Gandhi came to represent a legal client in a local dispute. He stayed for over twenty years, and, following an eviction from the train in Pietermaritzburg for being in a “white” train car, Gandhi became politically active in the struggle for racial equality and peaceful resistance in a movement that he called “Satyagraha”. In 1904, Gandhi started his first ashram, or community based on his values and religious contemplation, in Phoenix. This community consisted of a publishing house, a school, and his house. It was from here that Gandhi published the journal “Indian Opinion”, an initial action of protest that would see Gandhi in/out of prison on political charges for many years. It was after this that Gandhi returned to India to lead it towards independence from British rule.
Having visited the remains of the Phoenix settlement, yesterday, I did feel a certain sense of peace as strange as this may seem. While visitors can tour the small reconstructed house, as the first was burned down during Apartheid violence in the 1980s, and the Printing House, there are plans to upgrade the site further to renovate the original school site and to include a museum. A few objects from Gandhi’s time in South Africa, however, can be seen at the Indian Documentation and Cultural Centre in Durban. The staff at the Centre was very helpful in providing the information for this posting and hopes that the Centre will eventually be funded by the national historical commission.
The Satyagraha organization, with whom I also met, was founded by Gandhi’s granddaughter Ela Gandhi, her father having remained in South Africa upon Mohatma Gandhi’s return to India. While the organization remains committed to promoting principles of non-violence, it is finding itself increasingly involved in assisting the Indian community to come to terms with their new democratic freedoms since the fall of Apartheid. It has also become engaged in tolerance education in schools having sponsored essay/writing contests on the importance of democratic principles today. Tomorrow, I am scheduled to meet with a principal of a mostly Indian public school in Phoenix and, following this, I will be meeting with Satyagraha representative Clive Pillay for a tour of the Chatsworth community.
Apartheid in Durban
THE APARTHEID SYSTEM IN DURBAN: EFFECTS ARE LONG-LASTING
On July 12, 2007, Innocent Charmaine, education director of the KwaMuhle Museum in Durban, was kind enough to show me sites related to the Apartheid era in Durban and the Black townships of KwaMasha and Inanda. While the KwaMuhle museum is officially closed for renovations, Mr. Charmaine and I had a good conversation on how museums of tolerance disseminate their message to students and the possibility of future collaboration involving SA/US educators and students on an Apartheid tour.
The KwaMuhle Museum building itself is an appropriate setting for a museum dedicated to the racial pass system in Durban when, during Apartheid, all races were expected to carry identity cards dictating where they could live/work. Mr. Charmaine himself remembers having to stand in line during a documents identification search of his family as government officials would visit the Black townships and arrest those without the proper paperwork as undocumented Blacks from the rural areas, especially women, were unwanted, in Durban, by the white community. Indeed, the building, although now beautiful and serene, was the site where Black males, new to Durban and looking for employment, were expected to report for medical examination (prior to 1918, Black women were not allowed in Durban). The examination of male genitalia was carried out in public on the main street in front of the building. There is a statue in the museum courtyard memorializing this demoralizing experience.
Mr. Charmaine then showed me the area of Durban from where Blacks were forcibly removed in the early 1960s as the white community wished to create a buffer zone between them and the Black community. Although the land was not developed by the Apartheid regime, the area is now again home to the Black community but in the form of informal settlements as also seen in parts of Soweto, Johannesburg. In the township of KwaMashu, section 14, where women from rural areas were allowed, by permit, to reside with their husbands for two weeks for conjugal visitations was seen as were two room and four room “houses”. Two-room houses in KwaMashu were reserved for Blacks who agreed to marry partners as dictated by the Apartheid regime while four-room houses were for two families/couples already in existence at the time of KwaMashu’s establishment in the early 1960s. I also saw newer housing/apartment units (“hostels”), originally designed for single males but then integrated to include families as a means by which to reduce the level of violence occurring within them. Some members of the extended Zulu royal family, as Blacks in this area are from the Zulu tribe, live in these units. Mr. Charmaine also introduced me to his wife who is a teacher at one of the primary schools in the township. Mr. Charmaine was also a high school language teacher, having taught in both a township secondary school and then Durban High School which is a school for Durban’s elite of all races.
In Inanda, I was fortunate enough to be shown the Ohlange Institution which was founded by Dr. John Dube (first president of the ANC) in 1901. The Ohlange Institution, the first Black school founded by Blacks in South Africa, was based on the institutional model of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, USA. Luckily, Dr. Dube’s grandson was on hand at the original home of Dr. Dube, behind the school, which is now a museum, to answer my questions. Nelson Mandela cast his first vote, in 1980, at the site of the school. Dr. Dube is buried on the hill just behind his home/school. After this, I went to the Phoenix Settlement to see Mohatma Gandhi’s first established ashram.
On July 12, 2007, Innocent Charmaine, education director of the KwaMuhle Museum in Durban, was kind enough to show me sites related to the Apartheid era in Durban and the Black townships of KwaMasha and Inanda. While the KwaMuhle museum is officially closed for renovations, Mr. Charmaine and I had a good conversation on how museums of tolerance disseminate their message to students and the possibility of future collaboration involving SA/US educators and students on an Apartheid tour.
The KwaMuhle Museum building itself is an appropriate setting for a museum dedicated to the racial pass system in Durban when, during Apartheid, all races were expected to carry identity cards dictating where they could live/work. Mr. Charmaine himself remembers having to stand in line during a documents identification search of his family as government officials would visit the Black townships and arrest those without the proper paperwork as undocumented Blacks from the rural areas, especially women, were unwanted, in Durban, by the white community. Indeed, the building, although now beautiful and serene, was the site where Black males, new to Durban and looking for employment, were expected to report for medical examination (prior to 1918, Black women were not allowed in Durban). The examination of male genitalia was carried out in public on the main street in front of the building. There is a statue in the museum courtyard memorializing this demoralizing experience.
Mr. Charmaine then showed me the area of Durban from where Blacks were forcibly removed in the early 1960s as the white community wished to create a buffer zone between them and the Black community. Although the land was not developed by the Apartheid regime, the area is now again home to the Black community but in the form of informal settlements as also seen in parts of Soweto, Johannesburg. In the township of KwaMashu, section 14, where women from rural areas were allowed, by permit, to reside with their husbands for two weeks for conjugal visitations was seen as were two room and four room “houses”. Two-room houses in KwaMashu were reserved for Blacks who agreed to marry partners as dictated by the Apartheid regime while four-room houses were for two families/couples already in existence at the time of KwaMashu’s establishment in the early 1960s. I also saw newer housing/apartment units (“hostels”), originally designed for single males but then integrated to include families as a means by which to reduce the level of violence occurring within them. Some members of the extended Zulu royal family, as Blacks in this area are from the Zulu tribe, live in these units. Mr. Charmaine also introduced me to his wife who is a teacher at one of the primary schools in the township. Mr. Charmaine was also a high school language teacher, having taught in both a township secondary school and then Durban High School which is a school for Durban’s elite of all races.
In Inanda, I was fortunate enough to be shown the Ohlange Institution which was founded by Dr. John Dube (first president of the ANC) in 1901. The Ohlange Institution, the first Black school founded by Blacks in South Africa, was based on the institutional model of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, USA. Luckily, Dr. Dube’s grandson was on hand at the original home of Dr. Dube, behind the school, which is now a museum, to answer my questions. Nelson Mandela cast his first vote, in 1980, at the site of the school. Dr. Dube is buried on the hill just behind his home/school. After this, I went to the Phoenix Settlement to see Mohatma Gandhi’s first established ashram.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
RESPONSE TO EARLIER BLOG QUESTION ON CONSTITUTION HILL PRISON
I'm having difficulty accessing the Internet at my current hotel. When I can, I'll add pictures to Love Life post and post a blog on today's activities in Durban, South Africa where I met with representatives from the KwaMuhle Museum (about Apartheid and the race passes required in the Durban area), the building of the first black school by blacks for blacks (Dr. Dube), the Black townships of KwaMusha and Inanda, the area in Durban from where blacks were forcibly evicted - Cooperstown (sp?), the process of delousing of black male workers coming into Durban, the affluent mixed Durban High School, and the Ashram started by Mohatma Gandhi, when he lived in South Africa, called the Phoenix Settlement.
The question, however, centers around the prisin in Jo'bg on Constitution Hill. No, since the end of Apartheid, 1993-1994, prison conditions involving human rights have improved to the point where prisoners are not forced to strip in an open courtyard in public. Also, prisons are now integrated. After Apartheid, some of the prisoners at Constitution Hill were released if they had been interned because of political reasons. If they had committed crimes, they were relocated to other working prisons. The Constitution Hill Prison is now just a museum.
The question, however, centers around the prisin in Jo'bg on Constitution Hill. No, since the end of Apartheid, 1993-1994, prison conditions involving human rights have improved to the point where prisoners are not forced to strip in an open courtyard in public. Also, prisons are now integrated. After Apartheid, some of the prisoners at Constitution Hill were released if they had been interned because of political reasons. If they had committed crimes, they were relocated to other working prisons. The Constitution Hill Prison is now just a museum.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
A New Lease on "life": Love Life Gives Hope to SA Youth
A NEW LEASE ON “LIFE”: LOVE LIFE HELPS SA YOUTH TO ACHIEVE
On July 10th, 2007, I had the opportunity to visit with representatives from the non-governmental organization – “Love Life” which is the largest NGO in the world dedicated to HIV awareness and the reduction in new HIV infections - particularly new cases in South African youth. After talking with these representatives in their “rainbow colored” offices, perhaps a not so subtle indication of the organization’s commitment to promoting self esteem and individuality, I visited one of Love Life’s youth centers in the township of Orange Farm.
Love Life maintains youth centers, is involved with public health centers, and runs a purple Love Life party train in rural areas. While, on the surface, the eradication of HIV and parent/youth dialogue are main goals of Love Life, this organization does so much more in providing its youth volunteers and other children in the community with skill development that often leads to jobs. If it were not for Love Life, it would be difficult for youth in townships to break the cycle of poverty. Indeed, after having met and talked with youth involved in spreading the message of safe sex in their communities, it is clear that these young, innovative and ambitious people are the future of the country. Former skilled volunteers have become involved in the computer programming, marketing, and radio communication industries as skills in all of these areas are necessary for “Love Life” to carry out its marketing vision -particularly in rural areas without wide TV access. For instance, many of Love Life’s radio broadcasts are scripted and edited entirely by unpaid youth volunteers, known as “pinchies” (friends), and/or groundbreakers, former pinchies, now on stipend, who manage the various dance, theatre, sports, gender empowerment, poetry writing, physical wellness, computer, and radio programs. The focus at Love Life’s various youth centers is programming for youth by youth. In addition to this, Love Life brings in corporate partners - such as SABC, AVIS, and BMW, who have agreed to hire on former groundbreakers as full-time employees in their companies.
SABC, as part of their public service agreement with the government, has also agreed to broadcast TV spots for Love Life at no cost and to pay half of all development costs for these spots. Love Life covers all costs related to the production and airing of radio programming. Love Life also has an arrangement with several publishing companies thereby allowing free placement of Love Life’s teen magazine “Uncut” -published in both English and Afrikaans – in national newspapers. Bulletin board placement is also crucial to Love Life’s marketing strategy. Drawing upon research that demonstrates that “safe sex” lectures and sermons do not change youth behavior, Love Life aims to brand its message to the youth demographic used to being media savvy.
The future looks bright for Love Life. Originally expected only to be funded until 2010, the SA government has agreed to fund Love Life beyond this date. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation also agreed to help fund Love Life’s latest initiative – the Go-Go (grandmother) volunteer program.
On July 10th, 2007, I had the opportunity to visit with representatives from the non-governmental organization – “Love Life” which is the largest NGO in the world dedicated to HIV awareness and the reduction in new HIV infections - particularly new cases in South African youth. After talking with these representatives in their “rainbow colored” offices, perhaps a not so subtle indication of the organization’s commitment to promoting self esteem and individuality, I visited one of Love Life’s youth centers in the township of Orange Farm.
Love Life maintains youth centers, is involved with public health centers, and runs a purple Love Life party train in rural areas. While, on the surface, the eradication of HIV and parent/youth dialogue are main goals of Love Life, this organization does so much more in providing its youth volunteers and other children in the community with skill development that often leads to jobs. If it were not for Love Life, it would be difficult for youth in townships to break the cycle of poverty. Indeed, after having met and talked with youth involved in spreading the message of safe sex in their communities, it is clear that these young, innovative and ambitious people are the future of the country. Former skilled volunteers have become involved in the computer programming, marketing, and radio communication industries as skills in all of these areas are necessary for “Love Life” to carry out its marketing vision -particularly in rural areas without wide TV access. For instance, many of Love Life’s radio broadcasts are scripted and edited entirely by unpaid youth volunteers, known as “pinchies” (friends), and/or groundbreakers, former pinchies, now on stipend, who manage the various dance, theatre, sports, gender empowerment, poetry writing, physical wellness, computer, and radio programs. The focus at Love Life’s various youth centers is programming for youth by youth. In addition to this, Love Life brings in corporate partners - such as SABC, AVIS, and BMW, who have agreed to hire on former groundbreakers as full-time employees in their companies.
SABC, as part of their public service agreement with the government, has also agreed to broadcast TV spots for Love Life at no cost and to pay half of all development costs for these spots. Love Life covers all costs related to the production and airing of radio programming. Love Life also has an arrangement with several publishing companies thereby allowing free placement of Love Life’s teen magazine “Uncut” -published in both English and Afrikaans – in national newspapers. Bulletin board placement is also crucial to Love Life’s marketing strategy. Drawing upon research that demonstrates that “safe sex” lectures and sermons do not change youth behavior, Love Life aims to brand its message to the youth demographic used to being media savvy.
The future looks bright for Love Life. Originally expected only to be funded until 2010, the SA government has agreed to fund Love Life beyond this date. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation also agreed to help fund Love Life’s latest initiative – the Go-Go (grandmother) volunteer program.
Monday, July 9, 2007
THE MANY FACES OF SOWETO
JULY 9th, 2007
Soweto has a land mass of approximately 150 square kilometers and is home to over four million black South Africans; 90% with electricity. Although no longer forced to remain in Soweto, many upper middle class Black South Africans are opting to remain in the area to be close to businesses which are encouraged by the government in the form of financial incentives. Soweto also houses middle class and informal settlement sub-communities. While many informal settlers have been registered to obtain government housing/homes, since the later 1990s onward, these informal settlement communities continue to grow as skill-development and job training programs seem to be lacking and housing development is not keeping pace with demand.
While I provided a donation to talk with members of one of these informal communities and to take photos, I found it to be deeply unsettling to provide money to view intense poverty in such a voyeuristic way. Very few individuals stated that they had employment. Of course, one must ask disturbing questions such as to what level is the government responsible to remediate the evils of Apartheid, for how long, and how much initiative should come from the people themselves? Hopefully, Soweto will benefit, in the form of construction and service -related jobs - from the building of the 2010 World Soccer Cup Stadium and hotels already being built in the township. There also seems to be revenue generated through the international popularity of Wandie's Restaurant and tourist class Bed and Breakfasts run by the likes of Mama Lolo - a former school principal. Both of these places were also recently featured on Lonely Planet specials on South Africa. Some businesses in the Soweto tourist industry are also being run by White South Africans and foreigners but few/none of these individuals live in the Township. Given the significance of Soweto to the rise of the anti-Apartheid movement, and the international interest in this subject, Soweto should be able to continue to capitalize on its history.
I also was lucky to be the only patron on a tour organized by Soweto Tours. I took advantage by asking many questions. Like most tours, my tour guide and I went to the Roman Catholic Regina Mondi Church where Soweto youth took refuge during the 1976 Uprisings. Their hope that church was a sanctuary was soon to be dashed when the South African police raided the church and much destruction resulted. One can still see the damaged alter to this day. The church was also used for hearings associated with the Truth and Reconciliation Trials. We also went to Nelson Mandela's home and the Hector Pietersen Museum which memorializes the 1976 Uprising which resulted when the South African government forced Soweto schools to have instruction only in Afrikaans, the language spoken by most South Africans of Dutch/German descent. As most teachers in Soweto could not speak Afrikaans well, it was difficult to instruct students in all subjects especially the maths and sciences. Over 600 mostly young people lost their lives in this uprising, such as Hector Pietersen. However, one silver lining to result was a growing international impatience with Apartheid.
Saturday, July 7, 2007
UNITY IN DIVERSITY: SA DEPT. OF ED STRIVES FOR NATIONAL IDENTITY AND CULTURAL AWARENESS
On Friday, July 6th, I had the opportunity to travel to Pretoria, some 70 kilometers from Johannesburg, to meet with representatives from the South African Department of Education; specifically, representatives from the Office of International Affairs and the Office of Diversity. It was a rather informative meeting and, while an incredibly daunting task, I came away impressed with the commitment shown by the government to address these issues.
Considering that, during Apartheid which only ended 13 years ago, there used to be 19 departments of education, now 11 official languages, and outdated different curriculum from the days of Apartheid - one for whites, coloureds, and blacks, it is remarkable that the government has had the ability to consolidate education initiatives. Indeed, it is the DOE that now mandates a single educational standard while the prefectural departments (9) are in control of carrying out the national mission and implementation. DOE priorities include: 1) establishing a national identity; 2) integrating the different ethnic groups within South Africa; and 3) to form a bridge with the rest of the African continent, and, by extension, a continental identity.
In terms of the celebration of diversity and looking at the legacy of Apartheid from a multicultural perspective, the DOE has established several interesting programs in its over 30,000 public schools. First, it has been collaborating with the Institute of Justice in Cape Town on developing curriculum materials on the Truth and Reconciliation Trials. The DOE also has formed partnerships with Project Citizen, a leadership building competition program for/by youth, and other values promotion organizations such as valued citizens and the SA Human Rights Commission. This is being done by concentrating on involving the whole school community (i.e. parents/community) in values education, providing teacher development, engendering whole school reform iniatives that involve the principal, teachers, parents, and youth representatives on SMTs - school management teams, engaging prefectural executive councils of education, and promoting whole school celebrations of national days. The DOE is also committed to helping both students and parents in understanding that along with rights, students still have responsibilities to the home.
One of the most interesting innovations was establishing a 2 year pilot program/advanced certificate training for teachers in values which then be recognized by the school system as a valid teaching credential. 72 educators from each of the nine provinces participated. Although the program has ended, many universities, now all desegregated, have established values degree programs. It is hoped that educators trained in these new programs will bring South Africa forward. Equally interesting, the DOE is encouraging prefectural departments of education to develop community centres of social development and health, in particularly poor areas, to empower local community members and to develop a network of community resources.
These model reforms must succeed as the public is becoming increasingly frustrated, as demonstrated by the recent strikes, over continual poverty and disenfranchisement after fourteen years of freedom from Apartheid.
The meeting concluded with a discussion on the possibility of follow-up educational visits to both the United States/South Africa for educators and students from both countries.
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