BE Camp

* *Written on December 10, 2012**

Two weeks ago I participated in my first Peace Corps camp. It was a BE camp. BE is an acronym for Boys Excelling. It is the boys equivalent to GLOW (Girls Leading Our World). GLOW is a Peace Corps wide initiative and exists in many different PC country posts. For more info on GLOW click on this link: http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2012/08/196065.htm BE is Peace Corps Rwanda specific.

BE Banner. Photo by: Justin McDonald 

BE camp was four days long for the boys, a  week long for the staff with three days of TOT (training of teachers). But before I get into the inner workings of BE camp, we must start with an explanation of BE club.

BE clubs begin with the volunteers who work at schools and promote youth development. Whether a health or education volunteer (the two PC programs we have here), starting a BE/GLOW club is one of the best ways to teach life skills, and improve youth development.

BE and GLOW was started in my community about a year and a half ago by my former site mate. (A site mate is another volunteer who lives at your site in a different training program.) She was an education volunteer that lived about an hour walking distance away, and worked at the primary and secondary school. During my first three months, I was able to attend, observe, and get a better feel for the clubs she started and that I am now taking over.

The focus of BE and GLOW is for girls and boys to have a single sex focus group where they can become educated partners in gender equality, goal setting, public speaking, career planning, decision-making skills, and learning confidence. While some of these skills may be obvious to American readers, there is a great void in youth development here in Rwanda.

The education system in Rwanda needs some work. While there are some Rwandan all-star teachers who really push their students to be critical thinkers in the classroom, the majority of classes go like this:

Teacher introduces the subject and speaks. Teacher writes lesson on the board. Students copy lesson from board. Students memorize lesson. A day, week, month or many months’ later students are tested on what they memorized.

The camp. See if you can find me, hint: I'm wearing blue. 

There is zero critical thinking or discussions involved. Moreover the lessons are not interactive, and are straight up boring. School is run more like a factory rather than an opportunity for students to grow, learn, and develop. In most lessons students memorize what they’ve ‘learned’, and that is the extent of it. This bothers me, and I’ve seen little opportunity for young people to think for themselves. Personally, I don’t think this is an effective learning style, and this is where the importance of BE and GLOW materializes.  

When a young person speaks to you it is common that they turn their head in the opposite direction of where you are standing, and/or look at the ground. They usually speak softly and/or mumble. The indirect eye contact, soft spoken nature, and mumbling makes an awful combination when trying to understand a bantu language. In the beginning of my service I was often confused by this behavior, but was later told it is good culture to act in this way.

So I was completely shocked, and speechless when I attended my first GLOW club. Peace, a student, walked right up to me, shook my hand, looked me straight in the eyes and said, “Hi, my name is Peace.” I had never encountered a young person with so much confidence, let alone a girl with confidence. This is rare. I was so shocked I forgot how to respond to her, and we were speaking English. How she approached me with such confidence emulates the importance of GLOW and BE, and gives a nod to their wonderful teacher.

So how do these things start? The clubs are started by PCVs in their villages, and after clubs have been strongly established, PCVs get together and decide: a) if they want to have a camp, b) when, how, what, where, and why. And finally, a BE/GLOW camp is born.

The camps are held during school vacations, and are free for students to attend. Each camper is placed into a hero group with a camp counselor, a PCV. Their group is called a hero group because their group name is named after a famous person to model their own life after. Ex: Martin Luther King Jr., Steven Biko, Gandi, Fela Kuti, just to name a few of the great hero groups we had. This acts as your family for the four days.

During camp there are three days of classes, with three classes each day focusing on one topic.

Day 1 – Communication and Decision Making

Day 2 – HIV and Malaria

Day 3 – Gender Equality

After classes there are afternoon activities including: baseball, kickball, volleyball, soccer, dance, and bread making classes. There are three meals a day (rare for Rwandans) and after dinner are the evening activities, which included a bonfire with smores. If you are ever in Africa I’ve found that smores is one of the coolest cross-cultural exchange things to do.

Video still of me teaching. Classroom size at BE was about 25 students.

The fourth day is split into two half days. The first day they arrive and get settled, and the last day includes: a closing ceremony, packing up, and leaving before lunch (if you are lucky).

PCVs volunteer to play different roles; all PCVs are expected to lead an afternoon activity and help with evening activities. I played the role of Teacher, teaching a class on Relationship Building and Partnering in Gender Equality (Day 3), and co-teaching a class on Facts and Myths of HIV and AIDS (Day 2). The classes are ninety minutes each and when you teach a class you teach three classes in a row. I did this for two days in a row, and it was exhausting but awesome all rolled into one. The most common myth in the facts and myths class: AIDS was invented in a lab in America. In every class I had at least one boy ask “but Teacha, are you sure AIDS was not invented by Americans?” While no one knows where it came from for the purposes of the class, and to eliminate confusion, I responded with: “Yes, AIDS was not invented in America, Americans have AIDS too.” This blows their minds every time.  

http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2012/08/196065.htm