The first day began with lots of small talk. I met Rebekah from Chapel Hill in the elevator, then Jack from Carborro at the table. Then Yanessa from Raleigh joined us. I spewed the "I teach advanced math at a public Montessori middle school in Durham" and obligatory follow-up explanation more than enough times. We were first briefed in the history of the Center for International Understanding (CIU) which began through a partnership between Jimmy Carter and Jim Hunt in 1979 to pilot a visionary professional development program fro K-12 educators. In addition to the Global Teachers program (which is what this India program is a part of), CIU also has programs called Confucius Classrooms and the Latino Initiative. Confucius Classrooms uses partnerships in China to bring guest teachers into NC public schools to build a Chinese language program. The program has grown from 300 participating students in its initial year to 10,000 students currently enrolled in Chinese language courses. The Latino Initiative was in direct response to the shift in NC demographics and strives to integrate the Latino population into communities through education. They are working on a program called Global Leaders that will be similar to Global Teachers but for public policymakers.
We quickly jumped right in to a dynamic conversation about conversations with Tim Flood, Professor of Communication at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School. We talked about stereotypes, building relationships, keeping an open mind, and how communication facilitates all these things. Let me tell you, Tim Flood was one quotable guy. Here are some keys that are surrounded by giant doodled quotes in my notes:
"You can't count to seven billion by ones."
Stereotypes help us count by tens, hundreds, or even thousands. The important thing is not to stop at stereotypes... relationships are the rest.
"Culture is choice informed by coincidence."
"Culture is like traffic--sure, there are rules and norms, but ultimately people do what they want."
"No group of people anywhere in the world does something stupid over and over again unless they have no choice."
...or perceive they have no choice. And I'd add, it's usually only deemed "stupid" by an outsider.
Our next speaker was incredibly knowledgeable about India's history, economy, business, innovation, and more! He was Professor Jay Swaminathan, also of UNC's Kenan-Flagler. His 30-minute history of India took us from the ancient Indus Valley civilization that drew scholars from all over the world to Medieval India that was culturally rich with Portuguese, French, British, Arabic, and Asian influence. We then delved into Modern India where I learned that India was the world's largest producer for much of the 19th century. After independence from British rule, India took intense control of their newly founded government, rejecting anything foreign and planning and regulating every aspect of the economy. While the caste system was still pervasive as a division of labor, the British legacy of widespread English language became a unifying factor. In 1990, the government began to see a need for the closed economy to open up and increase the foreign reserves. Because of the intensely planned and controlled nature of the economy, India was able to be incredibly strategic about the way they opened the economy. With India's large population of young, educated work force, the opening of India's economy allows US companies to tap into the wealth of human capital in India by outsourcing of not only well-known technical support operations, but also of "knowledge processess" like medical and legal services. Perhaps this is more detail than you're interested in, but all of this contributes to the India that I will be visiting. While the country has made strides in infrastructure, it's been impossible to keep up with the growth. Education systems in rural communities have fallen by the wayside in the midst of the hyper competitive business boom in urban areas. Literacy rates are among the lowest in the world, while the middle class is emerging as a strong, vibrant workforce. I'll stop the rambling after this one last cool fact: India was struggling to get landline phone access to the country when cell phones emerged, and so the country essentially "leap-frogged" the landline infrastructure and now is home to half the world's cell phones with the cheapest cost to consumers!
Next, we had the awesome opportunity to talk with past participants of CIU Global Teacher programs in Denmark and China. They shared with us the many ways in which they have brought their experiences abroad into their classrooms, as well as tips and advice for our trip. Our last speaker was Geography Professor Rakesh Malhotra of Fayetteville State University. He was vital in giving us dos and don'ts, go-tos and don't-go-tos, and other basic "how to travel to India" type thoughts and advice. He was engaging and enthusiastic, and then joined us for our group dinner at Azitra, a local Indian Restaurant. Dinner was a great opportunity to begin getting to know my travel companions and try a variety of Indian cuisine. Our last speaker of the day, Rakesh, accompanied us to dinner. There he used either charm or a connection, but somehow got us a tour of the kitchen where we got to see the tandoor oven in action. Did you know that naan is cooked by being stuck to the inside surface of the tandoor? After a long day, I had learned so much, and couldn't wait for day 2, which I knew promised to have more specifics and logistics of the trip!
Day two was going to be packed with information again, so our program coordinator, Emily decided to start the day with a group yoga session. She is a certified yoga teacher, and used the opportunity to talk about the beginnings of yoga in India. After our wonderfully refreshing yoga practice, we moved on to the nuts and bolts of the trip. We discussed and asked about everything from the itinerary to roommates to health and safety to clothes and shoes to packing and more! At lunch, two young dancers (one about to graduate college and one about to graduate high school) came to exhibit traditional southern Indian dance. They were an incredible brother and sister pair (and products of Durham Public Schools) who performed dances that told spiritual stories. Also there from the Indian Classical Music and Dance Society was a singer who shared with us some traditional Indian music. Next, was a community panel. This panel was composed of four Indian-American community members--a kindergarten teacher, two MBA students, and the ESL director from Durham Public Schools--who have spent about half their lives in India and half in America. They answered all of our questions from the most trivial about shoes to the most insightful about education.
The last part of our day was spent planning and goal-setting and arguably the most important part of the orientation. You see, one of the responsibilities we have in the program is to be intentional about bringing our experience back and sharing it in our schools and classrooms. We spent the afternoon sharing and brainstorming and planning. I think I have a pretty cool idea as to how I hope to bring my India experiences back to the classroom, but that's for another post. I'm more excited than ever about this amazing adventure, and now have a lot of planning and shopping to do!
