The dreadful stories in this article from the International Rescue Committee made me furious.
The author describes how orphanages run for profit in Haiti abuse their position, keeping children in their care to generate revenue, rather than attempting to find family members who could care for them, and one orphanage where children were being ‘kept thin’ in order to generate more income from sympathetic philanthropists who saw pictures of the children.
This is the worst side of charitable giving, when people’s ignorant goodwill creates an industry like this which end up perpetuating the abuse of children.

Similarly, here in Cambodia, there are many so-called NGOs which offer tourists the chance to volunteer in an ‘orphanage’ for a day, if they make a donation.
A stream of strangers who have not been vetted in any way have access to vulnerable children. This kind of project is disruptive, and not respectful or empowering to the children or the people who work with them. And an afternoon's volunteering with children may be fun for the kids and volunteer, but I don't feel its positive impact can outweigh the negative. This type of irresponsible volunteering, and this ‘aid as industry’ thing, are the unfortunate products of sensationalis, poverty porn journalism and communications, unscrupulous opportunists and undiscerning donors.
I would like to state that the Haitian children's home supported by EDV which I posted a picture from not only makes efforts to find family members, but encourages family members who are not yet able to take responsibility for the children to come and spend time with them. Also, that I asked the children for pers

Starting Out in Peru

One of the projects that got me started on this career path was in Peru, several years ago. I will not name the organisation, though I thought the programme was great, and I would use the model. It was working with accelerated learning programmes, although we didn’t call them that, we called them schools.

In accelerated learning programmes (ALPs), older students cover the same educational ground as the standard-age learners, but at a faster and more intensive pace. This helps overcome the high levels of illiteracy among children affected by conflict, and boosts their chances of personal and professional development. ALPs enable students to study in a way and at a level appropriate to their ability and age. The curriculum is condensed, so they can get through it in half the number of years normally required for primary school, or less. They can study additional material suitable for their age and where they live. By catching up in this way, learners can then integrate into mainstream primary education (in the right class for their age) or transfer to secondary school or to skills-based technical and vocational education (Save the Children, 2010).

Primary education in Peru is free, but with the cost of uniforms, books, and the demands on children to work, either outside the home, or staying home to mind younger siblings; many children were out of school. The NGO would go to a public school and persuade them to give the use of a classroom; if this wasn’t possible the NGO would construct a simple building with the help of volunteers from the community. Then a social worker would canvas the poorest adjacent areas, going from door to door and explaining that children to come to this school to study, that pencils and books would be provided, as well as a small snack to eat, and that the children need not wear uniforms, and that any age between five and sixteen was welcome. The areas the students came from were mostly favela-like shanty towns, known in Peru as invasiones, with shacks built up with no running water, power, or proper sanitation. Many of the children who came had never been in a classroom
setting before,

and could not read or write at all. Some had dropped out of school, and were far behind their peers. Many of the children came initially only because we offered something to eat, but having begun studying, found the confidence to continue. The goal of the programme was that, after a year in our schools, the children would be ready to enter into the age-appropriate grade in public school, and the organisation would help with buying the uniform. The mixture of ages and abilities did not make for an easy classroom environment, and the teacher was helped by classroom assistants. This project was repeated in multiple locations throughout Peru. I was the director of the programme in its start-up stage in Chimbote, and this is something of which I am proud.

Technophobia

I came across this organisation which provides e-readers to schools in low-income countries.

An organisation with a similar theme is OLPC (One Laptop per Child) who coordinate the provision of low-cost, low-energy using laptops to schoolchildren in low-income countries.

I have some reservations about their programmes. I have never directly worked with them, and so have no way of knowing how they deal with these issues, which are not discussed on their website. I wonder how they deal with the inevitable risk in very disadvantaged regions that the laptops will be stolen and sold, by parents of recipients, or by corrupt education personnel. I have worked in areas where textbooks had to be kept under lock and key because it was understood that once a book left the classroom, it would be taken and sold. I have seen market-places full of items labelled AID- NOT FOR RESALE.  The laptops are intended for the children to take home and learn from on their own initiative, as well as in the classroom.  So, I would like to know how OLPC monitor the laptops, and ensure that the children can continue to use them.

 I spoke with someone who had worked with schools who were recipients of the OLPC laptops, who said that after a very short time, the kids were way ahead of the teacher in their use, limiting their effectiveness as a classroom tool.

I also have reservations about concentrating on laptops in areas where old-fashioned pencil-on-paper (chalk on slate) literacy has still so far to go. I believe that literacy must come first.

This reservation does not apply to the e-reader project, because reading is reading is reading, and an e-reader is just a medium for access to books. But I think the number of suitable books available must be quite limited as yet, and e-readers break down, which books don’t.

My concern about these innovative projects are that they may be driven by those who understand technology, and develop these devices to adapt to the context as they understand it, but are perhaps not aware of all the issues being faced in education in the countries where they are distributed.

Or perhaps I'm just being a technophobe, and overly hesitant in accepting innovation in education?

Au Revoir les Enfants

This week saw the departure of the majority of the Montagnard refgees with whom I have been working in Cambodia. After the government of Cambodia demanded the closure of the site where they were housed, Canada stepped in and offered them asylum. Most of the Montagnards I have worked with derrived their refugee status from a family member already in the United States, and they expect to be settled there eventually.They will be living in Quebec. I am so glad that they are going somewhere where they have the freedom to work and travel; many of them have been in the closed site in Phnom Penh for as long as six years. During that time, food and basic necessities have been provided to them, but they have not been allowed to leave the site except for official purposes and under supervision. This chunk of their lives has been in suspended animation. The education provided to them there has been less than ideal, and my biggest concern is for the young adults among them, who have grown up in this environment. 

I have loved working with them, and I am very sad to say goodbye, but hope that their futures will be bright in Canada.

 

Certainly, Canada in February will be difficult to adjust to for people from the Vietnamese highlands who have living on a closed site in Cambodia. Not just the weather, which may come as a shock, but the unfamiliar amenities and ways of doing things. Even seeing them off at the airport brought it home to me how many things will be new to them. At the airport, the automatic taps, the toilets, the escalators, were new, and sometimes bewildering or terrifying experiences. I put all my faith in the social services in Quebec to support them through this. I trust that they will discover, as I did, what a privilege it is to work with such amazing people.

Fear and Self-loathing in Humanitarian Space

The brilliant Hugo Slim in his essay ' A Call to Alms' says;

A sense of neo-colonial guilt, which can verge on self-hatred, lurks just below the surface of many individual humanitarian vocations and has a pernicious effect on humanitarian purpose and morale.

Slim is the only writer on humanitarian matters whom I have come across who has pinpointed this issue which I have seen so much evidence of among my peers, but rarely heard discussed. The uneasiness we feel about the neo-colonial nuances of what we do, and our frustration with the ineffectiveness of some projects can translate into feelings of negativity that threaten to take over.

Sometimes it's hard to distinguish between a healthy dose of self-satire which helps us laugh about the issues we deal with, and the self-hatred which Slim refers to. We humanitarian workers have to be able to laugh at ourselves, and I think we need to to be able to laugh at situations that really aren't funny. I find this blog; http://stuffexpataidworkerslike.com/ a great instance of aid workers poking fun at themselves, and I find most of the entries hilarious and very recognisable.
I  recently saw a cartoon video posted on Facebook entitled 'Aspiring Aid Worker Interview'.The tagline reads: This is a satirical look at the challenges of professional aid and development work with idealistic activists with good intentions. I haven't reposted it partly because it seems to have been removed for copyright reasons.  A young man with a robotic voice tells an interviewer with a robotic voice that he wants to be an aid worker, and gets put straight about how useless and uninformed and naive his ambition is, and how he doesn't need to go overseas. It was posted by a fellow humanitarian, and several other of my humanitarian friends 'liked' it, and commented on how funny it was. The young man protests 'But I have a Master's degree! I use words like 'empowerment'!' Speaking as one with a Master's degree, who uses words like 'empowerment', I'm not sure that I think this is laughable. If we don't believe in what we do, how do we expect anyone else to?

Refugee Education

My projects in Phnom Penh have diversified and I am now also working with the refugees who have been granted asylum in Cambodia, and those seeking refugee status. This has opened my eyes to a lot of issues surrounding refugee education. While the Montagnard refugees live at one site, and cannot leave without permission and supervision, the other refugee population, called 'urban refugees' live where they choose and have fewer direct provisions made for them. The Montagnards have food baskets delivered to them, whereas the urban refugees have more autonomy and the freedom to work.
The urban refugees that I work with come from Vietnam, Myanmar (both Rohingya and Burmese) Pakistan, and Somalia.  I have set up a programme for the women refugees, with the goal of empowering them by fostering a sense of community, as well as local integration, and exploring opportunities for vocational training. Because they live throughout the city, the logistics of meeting with all of them are difficult. There is one place outside Phnom Penh where a relatively large number of the Muslim refugees live, and I have met with some of the women there. One of the central difficulties is communication, and the visits become like the game we used to call 'Chinese whispers' (for politically correct reasons, while teaching I now call it 'Telephone') where a sentence is whispered from one person to the next around the room until the garbled final form is said out loud and compared to its original.  My English is translated to Urdu to Burmese to Rohingya and who knows what my original sentences become. Language is a central issue in refugee education, and even more complicated than I knew it to be. Few of the refugees speak Khmer, some because they can get by without it, and some because they are hoping to get to another country, and are unwilling to make the investment in learning a language that won't be of use to them. The kids go to English classes, as it seems all kids in this country do, and then, since English has become a common second language among the refugees, the children who have studied English and picked up Khmer become the family translators and negotiators, putting a lot of pressure on them, and leaving the women dependant on their husbands for money, and their children for communication. My project for empowerment has some way to go.

Cambodia

Several of my illusions about working for a UN agency have been shattered during my time here.My work is extremely interesting- advising UNHCR and its implementing partner NGO on education for the Vietnamese Montagnard refugees here in Phnom Penh, and having a hand in providing that education.

Unfortunately, the Cambodian government has ordered the closure of the refugee site by January 1st. UNHCR have asked for a three-month extension in order to get the refugees resettled, but we'll see how that goes.