Work
Posted By Sika on November 10, 2008
We finally finally got our new class of first years. Only 6 weeks late. The drama was this: The University of Malawi couldn’t decide how they were going to pick which students to select. The options were to base selection on merit only or on merit and region, recognizing that some areas get more slices of the pie and that corruption and differing levels of poverty (which are sometimes but not always strictly related) alter the opportunities for kids in some areas. The University of Malawi was going to institute the new quota system and then they weren’t and then they were again and then. . . .
“But Sika,” I can hear you saying, “You don’t work for the University of Malawi. What does this have to do with you?”
“But Sika,” I can now hear you protesting, “I actually don’t know where the hell you work. You don’t really expect me to remember, do you? Isn’t it good enough that I sort of remember something about you working in a nursing school, but really, I mean come on, you don’t know where I work, do you?”
To which I can only reply, “good point.”
So, I don’t work for the University of Malawi. I work for Malawi College Health Sciences. U of M offers a degree; we offer a diploma. If students are accepted to both programs, they’re going to go to U of M. We didn’t want to start a bunch of students who would then leave when U of M finally made their selections.
So far, I love the new group. I’ve only done one lecture with them so far, but they were so engaged and willing to discuss and question (even to question me, which is incredible and a positive thing, as far as I’m concerned.) When I told them that in their groupwork they had to write down exactly what a nurse does that makes her/him good, instead of generalizations like, “be nice,” they didn’t complain but just asked me for “a bit more time, madam.” Then, when I asked them to continue to add to their posters as the classes continue and they have more ideas about being a good nurse and what things they can do that might make them proud, they were actually excited.
It all makes it much harder to deal with the non-answering, non-participating, making me want to rip out someone’s hair—maybe mine, maybe theirs—behaviour of the second years.
I actually find my optimism about the new first years to be very similar to my optimism about Obama. Right now I’m so enthusiastic and hopeful about how things are going to be that I have to keep reminding myself that this is probably just the work/national equivalent of NRE*. I know that I’ll be disappointed soon and that I have to be vigilant and call out bad behaviour before it becomes a problem. But still. . .
*deep breath*
*JOY*
I told Mary how much I love the first years but I am worried because Flora is our head of department and she mocks students for getting wrong answers (I ask them to be brave and guess), and generally treats the students with a total lack of respect. As if they’re so stupid that the likelihood of them actually absorbing any information is pretty low, so you might as well just start yelling about how stupid they are. On their second day in class, I heard her yelling at them in the morning and David heard her yelling at one student in the afternoon because he didn’t give her his name before asking a question. With Flora in charge, it’s pretty easy to see how the hopeful, excited first years might turn into despondent, uncommitted second years.
Mary told us (in that tone that indicated that we should already know this, somehow. Maybe there’s telepathic signals between the rest of the staff that we’re just not spiritually evolved enough to be aware of) that Flora’s term is almost up, and Ferestes will be the new head of department. Ferestes, who when I was discussing our plans for working in the practical room**, volunteered to work after hours with us. Ferestes who works hard and, if she has to be away for trainings, has the students come in and lectures to them on a Saturday so they won’t get behind. Ferestes, who is really excited about Problem Based Learning***. I am practically giddy about the possibilities. Trying to keep a level head, but still giddy.
*New Relationship Energy—that giddiness that only comes before you know how the people you think you might care about irritate you.
**The practical room is where we have our mannequins and beds and sheets and other equipment so the students can practice before they go out and experiment on patients. David, Ferestes and I have some great plans for developing scenarios and getting the students to really think about what they’re doing. One of the most common complaints about our students in particular is that their skills aren’t up to par, so we’re looking to change that. In previous years for each skill we do in the practical room, we’d spend about 3 hours with 70 students and two teachers. And it just isn’t enough. This year we’ll spend an hour and a half with each group of 10-12 students for each skill. With Flora out of the picture, we won’t have to worry about how to maneuver around recalcitrant staff to get the stuff done that we need to get done, either.
***Problem Based Learning (PBL) was brought here by the Norwegians (although apparently different Norwegians than the ones who are doing e-Learning, or the ones who want us to develop a “Log Frame Plan”****). It involves sending the students to do more teaching of themselves. For instance, you might develop a scenario and then give groups of students a day to research it and to come back with tests that need to be done, the assessments and interventions, what diseases they expect to be in the clinical officer’s differential, etc., etc. When they ask for new data, you give it to them; if they never ask for a hemoglobin level, you don’t tell them that it’s critically low. It’s a lot of work for the teachers to develop the scenarios and a lot of work for the students, but it has the potential to be completely worth it.
****What annoys me about all this is that, as near as I can tell, all three of these programs are completely independent of each other. Then they all ask for changes to be made with no recognition of the labour involved or how the changes from one project may interfere with the changes from another. Add to it that there is very little sense of agency on behalf of the Malawian tutors, and you get statements like: “Then we won’t do the training. It’s their project anyway.” And people going to trainings just to get their allowances and people feeling the need to agree to unreasonable goals just to secure funding.
For instance, the Log Frame Plan asked if we could increase our student population by 10% by the end of 2009. I asked where we were going to put these students and how we were going to teach them, and given that PBL requires lots more groupwork and time investment, how were we going to manage that with 80 students. Not only did they all agree with me, but the campus director added to why my points were valid and brought up problems I hadn’t thought of.
Then she turned to the rest of the meeting and said, “So we agree, we can raise capacity by 10%.” And everybody agreed. When I pressed her on why she was agreeing to do something we couldn’t do, she said that we need the funding. Which makes sense I guess. And when the donors don’t seem open to excuses, even valid ones, I guess you lie rather than lose your money. Especially since we had to pull all the students from Mangochi and Ntcheu because we’re broke and couldn’t afford the allowances to have them in housing there. So now all our students are crammed into Zomba Central Hospital, and there just aren’t enough patients to go around. Which severely and negatively impacts on their learning. So it’s not like losing funding would be a small thing.
No comments yet.