Lessons Learned

I’ve learned a few lessons about educational administration during my time in the Marshall Islands. Some of these lessons I will share with you in person if you ask. But two that I’ll publicly voice regard efficiently administering the education budget.


WORKSHOP OVERLOAD

A workshop or conference can be useful if you learn a new skill and then apply it, or meet new people that will potentially help you be more successful at your job. But if I told you how much time people at the Ministry of Education spend on workshops and conferences, you would think it’s irresponsible.

If I told you how much money all that traveling costs (since a lot of conferences are in Hawaii, Fiji or Guam), then you would be abhorred.

I would never even consider telling you what percentage of the total education budget is spent on travel, workshops and conferences. Your health is too important to me.

Lesson: Ministry staff should quit traveling so much while the RMI’s children are in lousy schools.

Less talk – more chalk.


MY STAB AT EFFICIENCY

My Masters project here in the Marshalls was to compare the cost-effectiveness between three approaches to printing Marshallese curriculum materials. I have unequivocally found that the efficient choice is to off-shore printing to a publisher or print shop. A Ministry run print shop would attain no economies of scale – and paper and ink can drive costs way up. Over a ten year period, including shipping costs to Majuro, the MOE would save close to $400,000 by printing books through a publisher in Canada.

How much did my study cost?

I devoted the equivalent of about 3 months of full time work to this project. My salary was simply housing and utilities, since this was to fulfill my Masters degree, but even a paid consultant wouldn’t cost 20% of that $400,000 value. So my advice to the MOE would be, if you want to save money, hire somebody (full-time) to economically test different approaches to expensive programs and then streamline the expenses. This will also bring accountability to the budgetary decision-making process.

The Ministry’s budget will be decreasing over the next 15 years because the US will decrease its aid by $100,000 each year until the end of the Compact of Free Association in 2023. The Marshall Islands spends the most money on education per capita in the Pacific islands, but has some of the lowest test scores.

Lesson: The Ministry of Education should take more stabs at efficiency.


P.S.
If you would like a copy of my Masters paper on printing Marshallese curriculum materials, please request by e-mail.

Comedy of Errors - part 2

Iakwe yuk,

Dan the Man Caccavano has managed to upload (in two parts) the 2nd installment of the documentary about the putting on of Shakespeare's A Comedy of Errors at Marshall Islands High School.

In Dan's words:

"This is a very exciting project for many reasons, but mainly because my Media Team consists of Marshallese High School Students. That's right, I am teaching Marshallese students that have never used computers or cameras before, how to shoot film, conduct interviews, and edit on the computers. It is a really great project and the team is learning a lot of great skills."

"Here are the links to the three movies that we do have up so far."

trailer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akHfCEu_iDg

episode 2 pt. 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1_MEPgIAC0

episode 2 part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajtQbm_lB6g

Each Episode will focus on a different aspect of the team
Episode 1: Promotional Trailer
Episode 2: The Student Perspective
Episode 3: Leadership and Sustainability
Episode 4: A Community Event
Episode 5: The Big Show

The Aquarium

I sat on the edge of the boat as we jetted across the lagoon. Sufficiently slathered in waterproof sun block, I fearlessly enjoyed the hot sun on my head and back. It was a windy day so there were waves in the lagoon and the boat hopped them one by one.

My matching blue mask, snorkel and fins were behind my legs. My rented BCD (buoyancy control device) vest, regulator and eight pound weight belt were also next to me. 16 scuba tanks all lay on their sides, mostly at the front and back of the boat.

This would be the furthest I’d boated on the north side of the lagoon. I’d driven a number of times to Laura, the edge of Majuro Island and the point furthest south-west on the edge of the lagoon.

Our target: The Aquarium.

There is only one place where a heavy boat (like an open ocean fishing vessel) can enter the Majuro lagoon. Most people refer to this deep enough gap between the Majuro islands as the Pass. We scuba divers call it the Aquarium. It’s well known to be the best place to dive in Majuro – though not the Marshall Islands. There is such a strong current due to the changing of the tides that a lot of sea life comes in and out of the lagoon through this spot. All a diver has to do is sit on its edge, hold on to a rock, and watch the show.

Our first dive was not actually in the Aquarium. Some of us were inexperienced or hadn’t dived in a while, so we chose an easier location. I connected my regulator to the air tank and turned the valve. I had already strapped the tank to the BCD vest. Now I had to get it on. I heaved and managed to put on the vest – really heavy out of water. The last thing was to clean out my mask and put it on. There were six of us diving with two Marshallese dive operators tagging along to guide and help where needed.

One of them counted to three and we plunged backwards out of the boat. I had both hands on my mask to keep it from coming loose and letting water in. It was disorienting because the momentum of the backward fall caused me to flip while I started to sink. I righted myself and then continued to sink slowly, feet first, depending on my weight belt and tank to drag me downwards. Every few feet I pinched my nose and blew – as you would do on a plane – to equalize the air in my nasal and ear passages.

On the first dive I unfortunately had fogging problems. It isn’t easy to clear your mask at 45ft under water. But I managed to see one of the eagle rays that the group saw and lots of fish up close. I saw coral I’d never even seen in pictures.

After a 45 minute bottom time, we swam up to 15ft below the surface and waited for 3 minutes. This is to avoid getting the bends, which is caused by excess nitrogen in the blood (a side effect of breathing tank air under water). I inflated some of my remaining air into my BCD so that I could float on the surface. The boat picked us up within seconds of emerging.

We had lunch on a beautiful island. After heat loss and the exertion of diving, we were all starving. After an hour break we jumped back onto the boat for our second dive, this time in the deep water pass that connects Majuro to the Pacific.

This time we dove down 70ft and couldn’t see the surface anymore. It was easy to even forget about the outside world. Our first show was a huge school of bright blue fish with yellow tails. Another school of silver fish went by. Then I saw a white tip shark, about 4ft long. It moved slowly and gracefully. I’ve always dreaded sharks. I’m even scared of them in fresh water lakes (and I know, I know, there’s no sharks in fresh water lakes), but like many of you, I have one or two irrational fears. So coming to the Pacific and spending a lot of time in the water, I expected to run into a few of em, and I both dreaded and looked forward to it. Being with seven divers did make me feel safer. It helped that none of the sharks got too close (none that I saw anyway!).

The number of interesting fish and coral that I saw was pretty overwhelming. I saw another shark, also white tipped. Somebody else saw a grey reef shark, but I must have been staring at a purple fish or something.

We had such a nice time, and since I leave in about two weeks, some of us decided to commit to more of the same next week. My friend Kristen, who had been to the Aquarium four previous times, said that this was kind of ho-hum for the Aquarium. If so, I should be in for quite an experience next week.

A Comedy of Errors

No, not your love life.

I'm talking about the Shakespeare comedy. It's the perfect play to put on in the Marshall Islands. It involves a boat arriving at an island. Two of its passengers have identical twins on the island (but unknown to them). Thus ensues a travesty of mistaken identities.

A group from Dartmouth College in New Hampshire has made it a tradition of coming to Majuro to put on a Shakespeare play for the past few years. My good friend Dan Cacavano, a volunteer high school teacher, has gotten involved through the making of a 5 part documentary series outlining the making of A Comedy of Errors. He's using the opportunity to teach a student media team basics about interviewing, storyboarding and editing (in IMovie).

Here is the link to Part 1, which acts as a backgrounder.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akHfCEu_iDg

It took Dan 7 hours to upload this file. So if you watch it, enjoy every second.

Social Studies Lesson

I was roped into the Curriculum Committee a while back, which is responsible for reviewing a draft of each subject’s curriculum from kindergarten to eighth grade. Science and math were already done; we had just begun working on social studies. It’s painstaking work.

But it’s been a great opportunity for me to learn a little about Marshallese culture. One of the Ministry’s priorities is to majol-ize the curriculum, which means making the curriculum relevant to a kid that grows up on an outer island here in the Marshall Islands. Social Studies is obviously a relevant subject for this, where students can learn about Marshallese culture and history (rather than the imported American version).

In grades 1 and 2 kids have to learn about their clan or jowi. This is really important because a lot of kids in high school know little about their family, even though the jowi is not just a group of people you eat with at Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner (just kidding). The jowi is a political entity with dispute settling mechanisms. Land and title are passed along through the jowi. Marshallese society is matrilineal, which means that unlike in our patrilineal society, inheritance occurs through the mother. That means that I stand to inherit things from my mother’s brother, or my maternal uncle – not my father. His stuff gets passed along to his sister’s family.

Think of feudal Europe. If the king died, his eldest son would inherit the throne. In Marshallese society it works in similar ways, except remember that it’s matrilineal. Therefore, when the king dies, one of his sister’s children stands to gain.

But what’s strange with the modern age is that people travel a lot more. So let’s say I travel to a different atoll when I get married. Then my uncle dies and I become the head of the jowi. But my younger brother, who stayed behind, starts making decisions in my place. This might irk me because I think he’s usurping my rightful role.

There are a lot of disputes in traditional courts related to this kind of issue. It wouldn’t have been as much of a problem 50 years ago, when people didn’t travel as much between atolls (or to other countries). But today there are boats (and there used to be a domestic airline, what happened to it??) plying the sea routes of the 29 atolls.

It’s all very confusing, I know, especially when you interlace the modern political state (with mayors, senators and a president). I’m no where near understanding how it all works. Suffice to say that the Marshall Islands is in a process of flux, whereby traditional institutions are being challenged (and complimented) by new institutions (and values).

End of Social Studies lesson.

The Place where No Pandanus Grow

Beyond the island of Enecko lies the place where no pandanus grow. It is a land barren of trees; a rock-riddled wasteland inhabited by eels at the high tide. As we gaze out across the expanse, a group of islands are visible in the distance. On the ocean side, the breaking waves cause a mist of salt air, like water poured onto red bathhouse coals.

Sharp rocks protrude precariously in every which direction, making each step awkward and clumsy. We step slowly, carefully, aware that the ground is either spiky or smoothly slick. A tumble in this place would cut and scrape.

A coconut crab scuttles three quick steps off the edge of a mushroom shaped rock and does a clawed breast-stroke till safely in its shadow.



Then we came upon an eel, grey and snake-like. Its head was deep inside the cleft of a rock, hunting for food. As we splashed towards it, our water shoes’ rubber soles protecting our feet from the rocks, the eel pulled its head out slowly and then stared at us suspiciously. We were standing but a few feet away.

After sizing up the situation, the eel decided it was cornered. It sprang at Ali and she leapt as high as possible with our unsure, rock-riddled footing. Despite Ali’s yelp, the eel was more afraid. In the shallows, the eel writhed a zig zag swim, making a sound like

whoosh whoosh whoosh!

I freed my breath because it had been caught in my throat. We kept walking. I silently marvelled at how far Ali had come, since she had never even liked camping before.

The water was beginning to rise. Waves began to tickle our ankles. It was like the land was tipping towards the lagoon and the ocean water started to seep in.

Picture a pan three-quarters filled with water. But imagine that the pan is sitting in a sink, itself filled with water, but just below the edge of the pan: two separate bodies of water. If I should pour more water into the sink, however, the sink water would overcome the pan edge and fill it completely, creating a single body of water.

Now imagine that the ocean is the sink and the pan’s edge is islands surrounding the lagoon. The space between islands becomes land at the low tide as the water recedes. But at the high tide the water from the ocean flows over the space between the islands.

An atoll is a strange place.

Nuclear Victims Day

Friday February 29th was Nuclear Victims Day in the Marshall Islands. I don’t know if the holiday is only celebrated in leap years, but I’ll hazard a guess that it’s simply the last Friday in February. Though detonating 64 nuclear bombs in the Marshall Islands was certainly traumatic to the environment and the people exposed to cancer in the aftermath, it was a day with little fanfare.

I’m used to the pomp and circumstance of Remembrance Day (Veterans Day to Americans), where we wear poppy flowers, hear poetry about Flanders Field and otherwise feel grateful to the folks that fought in the world wars. But I guess an active group of veterans can keep things alive. Somebody has to stand on the street corner and exchange the red and green flower I pin to my jacket for a small donation.

In this case, there aren’t “veterans” of the nuclear testing done by the Americans in the 50s and 60s. Just victims.

It was fitting that Ali and I should find ourselves living on solar power on Nuclear Victims Day. We trekked across the lagoon to Enecko for a getaway from the every day. Both of us have things coming to a head at work, a lot to plan for when we get back to North America, and were in dire need of a swim in clean water. We stayed for the whole weekend.

The picture depicts the solar panel behind the chalet at Enecko. The chickens are responsible for guarding it.

Millipede Motel

No Vacancy.


Ants dance in conga lines; flies swarm like dog-fighting jets; cockroaches scuttle in dark places. Millipedes lack the social camaraderie of ants, the grace of airborne flies and the speed of cockroaches. They do have many legs, though. They also share with the above insects the propensity to invade our household.

There’s no vacancy at Ali and Steve’s Millipede Motel. We’re full out. Go sleep in a barn, or something. This past week we’ve been kicking millipedes out by the foursome. They crawl with interminable slowness in different corners of the bathroom. Usually they’re as long as a pinky finger; those are the adults. But in the past we’ve just had to sweep away one or two of them a week.

Then some mama must have had a brood of ‘em right behind our toilet. Every time I go to the bathroom there are three or four more to contend with. Two are in the shower. One’s behind the toilet and another on the wall to the right of the sink. I usually take a few strips of toilet paper and set about the grim business of expulsion. When I touch one it’ll wrap itself into the millipede version of a foetal position (like settlers circling the wagons before a raid). Then I pluck it up and carry it to the door and toss it out like a customer that can’t pay the bill.

We went nuclear on them today. We poured Clorox down the drain and sprayed the corners with Mortein. But I hate that option. Mortein is one toxic spray. I’m not sure who I’m harming more, the unwelcome millipedes or myself.

Positive Karma

I’m not sure whether I believe in karma or not, but I think it’s a nice idea. Lots of people believe that doing right for right’s sake is good enough and I’m one of them. But karma, or we could call it Galactic Justice, introduces accountability into the mix. It lets me think that someone, or something (maybe a big computer), is keeping a tally. When I was a kid I believed that that someone was Santa Claus. Now I have no idea.

But I had what felt like an experience in positive karma yesterday. It was a regular day at work. One fellow walked into the office while I was checking my e-mail. He was writing a memo inviting folks to a health-related event and wanted me to proof-read it. We don’t work together but I’m always eager to seem useful, so I looked it over for him. He was grateful. Then later the same day, another colleague walked into the office. She’s taking a class at the College of the Marshall Islands, the local community college, and had a question about a concept that would be discussed in her lecture that day.

Gestalt

I knew it was related to psychology and surmised it was of German origin, but I couldn’t explain what it meant. So I jotted the word down and said I’d get back to her within the hour. I punched in the web address for Wikipedia and waited…. (the Internet connection here is quite slow). Eventually I was able to find an entry on Gestalt Psychology. I read and half-understood. I printed the entry and gave it to my colleague, explaining what I now thought the term meant.

She smiled and said, “Kommol.”

I smiled back, “Jouj!”

That made my day. I racked up some points. I have a simple way of judging good days from bad ones (not to be conflated with happy vs sad days).

Here is the equation I use:

A = b(z)/p³ - ߪ + z/p³


Just kidding.

I have no formula. But I essentially do judge whether I contributed more than I took. Some days I’m karma-positive, like yesterday. Other days, I’m karma-neutral, like when I lay in a hammock reading all day, abstaining from kicking any dogs. Occasionally I’m karma-negative, like when I’m grumpy all day, thus spreading a negative vibe.

Back to yesterday, the day could have ended, and like I said, I racked up a couple of points in the right column. But when I got home I decided to do a little yard work. So I borrowed a neighbor’s machete and was getting ready to chop up some weeds.
(Note: I learned that killing weeds, to my surprise, doesn’t give me positive karma. Go figure.)

But a bunch of little kids had gotten into the compound. They were students of my friend Tim, who’s a volunteer at the elementary school close by. He runs an after-school fitness club with his best students (as a reward they get to hang out with him one afternoon a week) but yesterday they were mostly interested in fooling around. So a few of them knocked on Ali’s and my door and we answered with some surprise. When I stepped out to start weed whacking, several decided that they would help. It was really sweet. Three together held the trash bag and another girl started pulling weeds independently. After we filled 2 trash bags I was satisfied and thanked them.


Good karma paying me back or just good luck?


Like I said, I don’t know, but karma is a nice idea.

Inhale, bubble...bubble...bubble

I accomplished my first open water dives yesterday. I'm 1 day away from getting Open Water Scuba Certified.

It was quite fantastic.

We reviewed some of the things I learned during the shallow water dives, which had taken me to about 15ft of depth. I flooded my mask and cleared it under water, towed a "tired" diver and made switching from my regulator to my snorkel at the surface a routine.

But what was really cool was getting to explore the lagoon floor 40ft beneath the surface. On both dives, my instructor and I descended to a point where we couldn't see the surface anymore. I thought it'd get dark, but at that depth it was just as bright as the surface.

The highlight was on the first dive, where we saw a big lion fish. They look like fat armoured samuri with a fan of knives protruding from top and sides. This one's body was a little bigger than a basketball, but its spikes came out another 2ft. It was resting quietly beneath a coral ledge.

Next weekend we'll accomplish a few more tasks and explore 60ft down in two dives (the maximum I'm allowed to descend with this certification) and we'll send away for my PADI member card.