World Learning Commemorates World Day Against Child Labor 2009

Photo by Azra Kacapor

This year’s theme, “Give Girls a Chance: End Child Labor”

Today World Learning issued the following statement in commemoration of World Day Against Child Labor and the tenth anniversary of the adoption of the International Labour Organization Convention No. 182, which addresses the urgent need to work toward the prohibition and elimination of the worst forms of child labor:

By commemorating the tenth anniversary of this historic international agreement in defense of children’s rights, World Learning celebrates the substantial progress made toward the convention’s critical goals while recognizing the tremendous challenges that remain. This year’s theme, “Give Girls a Chance: End Child Labor,” resonates deeply with our development priorities and approach. World Learning is committed to the removal of all children from hazardous work environments and recognizes the unique systemic threats that exist for girls who are exploited for their labor.

Photo by Azra Kacapor

Across the world, an estimated 62 million girls are out of school and 100 million girls are involved in child labor. Poverty and lack of education too often force girls into some of the worst forms of child labor, often in hidden, unhealthy, and dangerous work situations. In many countries, girls’ labor is deeply entrenched in cultural practices and gender norms and takes place behind closed doors, removed from public scrutiny and concern.

World Learning’s approach to the elimination of child labor focuses on increasing access to quality and equitable education. Our work is broadly designed to address the worst forms of child labor, with a key focus on reaching those children involved in invisible forms of labor and ensuring they have access to quality schools. Through projects in Angola, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Peru and Guatemala, World Learning works with parent-teacher associations, Ministries of Education, and Girls’ Education Advisory Committees (GEACs) to ensure girls’ access, retention, and performance in schools. To address social barriers to girls’ education, World Learning’s programs help establish the school as the locus of community resources and influence. Through schools, community partners can unite and mobilize to tackle gender bias and protect girls from exploitation within their communities.
For examples of World Learning’s work combating child labor through education, see a video from our Wiñari project in Ecuador, entitled “Erika’s Story.” Also see a video from our USAID-funded CASCAID project in Ethiopia about a girl orphaned by HIV/AIDS who’s been given a chance to stay in school.

World Learning believes that educating girls is the single best investment that can be made to combat child labor and tackle the root causes of poverty. Our community partners daily witness the transformative power of girls’ education on the wellbeing of their communities when young women who have received education go on to reinvest in their children and their communities. More resources need to be mobilized to improve the quality of education for disadvantaged girls and boys. This investment will pay global dividends for generations to come.

Read more about World Learning International Development Projects.

SIT Graduate Institute Campus Community Farm Works to Create a Sustainable Food Source

The SIT Brattleboro campus now has an active community farm, thanks to the hard work of SIT Graduate Institute students, alumni and staff from the Brattleboro-campus Environmental Working Group. The 2 acres farm, donated by World Learning, is being tilled and planted by the Farm Manager Steve Hed (an SIT Graduate alum) with the support of the World Learning/SIT facilities crew. The project is a partnership with Post Oil Solutions, a Brattleboro-based organization.

The vision of this initiative is to create a sustainable and just food system, both locally and globally.  This vision is derived from a deep concern that people today either lack access to or are disconnected from the importance of nutritious food grown through sustainable agriculture methods.  Produce grown on the farm will be used in the SIT Graduate Institute cafeteria and donated to the Brattleboro Drop In Center, a community food shelf. 

Through the efforts of all involved, the Farm Initiative group has received a grant from the Vermont Community Foundation. Additional funds were also raised from the RENEW Conference on Social and Ecological Renewal held last month on the SIT campus.

There will be updates and photos available on the SIT Graduate Institute website, so look for news about upcoming gardening and food preservation workshops, produce sales, farm tours and other community events. See the PDF for more info or write to SITFarm@sit.edu.

SIT Study Abroad Alum Continues to Give through the World Learning/SIT Global Reciprocity Fund

Nadine Channaoui attended SIT Study Abroad Bolivia: Culture and Development Program in fall of 2008 and will start her final year at Brandeis University this fall.  She is currently fundraising for her host community in Bolivia through the World Learning/SIT Global Reciprocity Fund. 

SIT Study Abroad’s model of international education is grounded in the host communities and organizations with which they work. To support these communities and partnerships, SIT Study Abroad is expanding efforts to fund local initiatives in healthcare, the environment, education, and more through its new Global Reciprocity Fund.

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I was not originally planning on studying abroad in Bolivia.  Honestly, I didn’t even know where Bolivia was when I started browsing through programs.  Early on, I knew that I wanted to go to a Spanish-speaking country.  Later in the search process, I realized that I wanted to go to a developing country.  I was also very drawn to SIT programs as they seemed to add a whole other twist to studying abroad.  When (a friend) mentioned the (Culture and Development) program in Bolivia, I got hooked.  I read about the rich cultures and pressing social issues and knew that Bolivia would offer me a completely different experience from anything I had ever known—which was ultimately exactly what I wanted.

When I arrived in Cochabamba, Bolivia, the city seemed as spunky as its name with its panoramic mountains, colorful buildings, and picturesque plazas…However as I spent more time in the incredibly diverse country, I was gradually introduced to the complexity of its interior: the cracks that needed repairs; the features that, though different from my familiar home, were completely functional; and the differences among various regions, opinions, and cultures that all existed “under the same roof.”

During one of (SIT Study Abroad’s) seminar classes, we had sociology students from a local university visit and we all watched a couple of SIT student-made films about Bolivian migration and had a discussion about the topic afterwards.  One of the films, by Hanna Rosenthal-Fuller, was a series of interviews that discussed what life was like for children and spouses who lived in Bolivia while their family members migrated abroad.  It was a very touching film and really tugged at my heart strings.  I immediately wanted to learn more about the topic and wanted to provide some type of resource for the children. 

I decided to investigate this theme for my Independent Study Project (ISP), a month-long, field-work-based project done at the conclusion of the program. My investigations, which explored the emotional and behavioral effects of children with migrant parents, included volunteer work with an NGO, interviews with professionals, and group charlas (or chats) with Bolivian children who had at least one parent or relative abroad. I was not surprised to find that the children experienced emotional, academic, and responsibility alterations after their parents went abroad; however I was surprised to learn that despite their grief, they often so maturely understood that their parents left to benefit them… I was also aware that children’s literature was hard to come by in Bolivia and wanted to give back to a society that had taught me so much.  Writing a children’s book during my ISP seemed like the perfect solution!

 I hope that my book helps children with migrant parents understand that they are not alone, it is okay to miss their parents, and there are various methods of expressing and coping with their emotions.  At the conclusion of my study abroad experience, I was able to read my book aloud to a small gathering of local children. I’ll never forget their eyes gazing at me and my book as I read a story to which, more than likely, at least one of those ten children could have personally related.  I also hope that the book informs other children and adults around the world about the trend of Bolivian migration and possible emotional repercussions for children.

I learned many lessons from being in Bolivia.  One simple lesson that I learned and now think about on a nearly daily basis is that things aren’t so bad.  Life is so different “on the other side” and if people there (in Bolivia) are alright, I will be alright too.

(My advice) for students about to leave on SIT Study Abroad Programs: dare to be different.  By that, I mean to say challenge yourself to try new things that you never ever imagined you would do.  You’re already going on an incredibly unique program in a foreign country, you might as well make it is whacky, adventurous, and enlightening as possible! 

For the alumni: share, share, share!  It’s easy to fall right back into the fast-paced US American life, but when you share your experiences with others, it gives you a chance not only to remember your incredible experience, but also to educate and inspire others.

Visit Nadine’s fundraising page.

View pictures of Nadine’s experience in Bolivia.

Iraqi Women on the World Learning International Visitor Leadership Program Meet Secretary of State Hillary Clinton

Written by Marilyn Saks-McMillion, Assistant Director and Senior Program Officer, World Learning Visitor Exchange Program

World Learning’s International Visitor Leadership Program seeks to promote understanding through personal and professional interactions.  Visitors on this program are current or potential leaders in their country and visit U.S. organizations and meet with U.S. visionaries in an effort to promote diplomacy and understanding.  In April, this State Department-sponsored program hosted a group of Iraqi women leaders who began their exchange by meeting briefly with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. 

Their three-week program, entitled Women as Social, Political and Economic Leaders, was designed by Marilyn Saks-McMillion, Assistant Director and Senior Program Officer of World Learning’s Visitor Exchange Program.  After spending a week in Washington, DC, the group traveled to New York City, then to Sacramento and San Francisco and finally concluded their program in the Dallas/Forth Worth metroplex. Highlights of the program in Washington included briefings at the State Department, Justice Department and the Pentagon, and a half-day training session on local governance at the International City/County Management Association (ICMA). 

While in New York, the group traveled to Rutgers University’s Eagleton Institute of Politics for a half-day seminar on women in politics followed by lunch, where they met former Governor Christine Todd Whitman and other distinguished academic researchers.  They also met with officials at Johnson and Johnson to learn about programs that promote and mentor women in a large corporation.  Back in New York City, they met with a Member of the New York City Council, visited the U.S. Mission to the United Nations and learned about the Girl Scout movement, as well as had a meeting with representatives of Working Mother magazine and the National Associate of Female Executives.

In Sacramento, they visited the local county elections office and met with organizers of a local Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure to learn about raising public awareness and research funds for the battle against breast cancer.  The following day, they participated in the 5K run and addressed the crowd of 24,000 expected runners and supporters.  In San Francisco, their program included meetings at a business incubator that helps fledgling women entrepreneurs, a trip to the Napa Valley/Sonoma area to visit women-owned wineries and the opportunity to participate in a local volunteer activity for the homeless.

Their visit to the United States concluded in Dallas and Fort Worth.  They visited the headquarters of the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure to learn more about raising awareness of this important health concern, funding research and treatment and doing international work.  The group visited an all-girls public charter school designed to teach leadership to girls in grades 6-12 and the small town of Waxahachie to meet members of the Junior Service League.  Finally, as a surprise, the delegation met former First Lady Laura Bush, to highlight her longstanding volunteer work with the Susan G. Komen organization.  Cultural events included a visit to the National Cowgirl Museum, a visit to a western art museum and the Fort Worth Stockyards with its city-owned herd of longhorn cattle, capped off with an evening rodeo at the Cowtown Coliseum.

SIT Graduate Alum Offers Advice on Professional Networking via LinkedIn

Written by Megan McBride, SIT Graduate Student/World Learning Americorps VISTA
 

Laura Beth Barnes, alum of SIT Graduate Institute’s Program in Intercultural Leadership and Management, quips that she first logged on to LinkedIn as a way to avoid working on her capstone, the final project SIT Graduate students complete before finishing the program.  Her results, however, are not a joke: within ten days of creating an account, she received calls from head hunters offering her jobs in her field of sustainability and corporate responsibility.  Now, Laura is honored that the same people whom she regarded as pioneers in her field while she studied at SIT Graduate Institute view her as their peer and contact her with questions.     
 
In November of 2007, Laura signed-up for LinkedIn, an online professional networking site.  At the time, she was skeptical about it and started out by inviting only five people to join her network.  Wanting to keep her personal and professional life separate, she was at first hesitant to invite friends to join her network.  Laura soon realized that having more people in her contact base gave her a larger network and she started to reach out to people in key positions and locations.  From these initial contacts, she received a wide range of invitations from other professionals in her field.   
  
Laura currently works as a Responsible Sourcing Manager for Mothercare PLC, a UK-based retailer with stores internationally.  Prior to joining Mothercare in July 2009, she procured several short and long term consulting jobs through her connections on LinkedIn.  Laura comments that jobs in the professional fields that SIT prepares students for are difficult to find and usually not advertised on online job sites such as Monster or Yahoo Jobs.   She notes that using LinkedIn has not only introduced her to a wide net of people in her field but has also helped her stay in touch with those she meets at conferences and helps them to remember her and to understand her field of work. 

Laura observes that LinkedIn is like Google in that you can search for profiles containing certain key words.  She utilizes key terms from her field in her profile and recommends finding a balance between business and non-profit terminology to gain the broadest search results.

Laura cautions online networking site users to be vigilant with all their profiles, whether on professional sites or the more social sites such as Facebook.  She guards her online presence and is aware that her reputation is at stake when she forwards a contact invitation from a colleague to a person in her online network.   

Like a resume, Laura advises keeping profiles up-to-date with current information and accomplishments and she recommends updating profiles at least every two months.  When a person updates his or her profile on LinkedIn, all contacts are automatically sent an update.  Laura regards this as a perfect way to “stay on the radar” of other professionals in her field.  She warns that one can not simply create a profile, leave it untouched and expect results. She strongly encourages other World Learning alums to take advantage of the global connections they have via World Learning’s LinkedIn site.

Take Advantage of World Learning’s Online Networking

written by Jennifer McClearen, Career Counselor, SIT Graduate Institute

As I clicked “submit application” on yet another online employment opportunities site, I hopefully sent my professional self into cyber space. I wondered who would be receiving me on the other side and if that person would be able to distinguish me from a mound of other virtual applicants.

Not willing to leave it to chance, I logged on to the LinkedIn website (a “Facebook” for professionals) and searched my “connections.” No one I knew personally was working for the organization, but another SIT Graduate Institute alum was employed there and was “connected” to several people I knew. Introducing myself to the alum via email, I timidly asked for any information she had relating to the open position in her organization. I hopefully sent my professional self into cyber space yet again.

The alum wrote back to me within 10 minutes with her number and a friendly “anything for a fellow World Learning alum.”

Although a job did not materialize from the conversation that I later had with this particular connection, I learned a very valuable lesson about the new world order of social networks—defined as an online community of people who share interests, experiences, or affiliations. In the troubled economic climate that confronts us, it is ever more important to maintain connections with the World Learning family. Some studies show that nearly 70% of jobs are obtained through networking, so we need each other to maintain career vitality in troubled times.

LinkedIn is a social networking website that utilizes a virtual six degrees of separation to link people of like career experiences and interests. Once you connect with people you know, the site will create a network for you that includes your friends and colleagues but also their affiliates.

LinkedIn has features for both the job seeker and for the individual desiring to boost or maintain professional relationships. A job seeker can survey organizations and uncover anyone working there who is connected to her within a few degrees. A trainer can join professional interest groups and participate in online discussions relating to his field of expertise. A non-profit manager can search for guest speakers for an upcoming conference she is planning. The list of functions is long and constantly expanding.

While other social networking sites may not be geared towards professional connections and job opportunities, there are advantages of keeping in touch via Facebook or Twitter. On a smaller scale than LinkedIn, Facebook can search your contacts and networks for people affiliated with organizations or job markets you are targeting. Additionally, strong social networks provide a forum to interact with people whom you completely lost touch with via other communication methods.

Join us on World Learning’s Facebook and LinkedIn pages in order to connect with old classmates and alumni from other cohorts. Our network is only as strong as its active participants.  Build and maintain your social network because you never know when someone would be willing to do “anything for a fellow World Learning alum.” 

Jennifer McClearen is a career counselor at SIT Graduate Institute and a recent alumna of the Program in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management.

The Rev. Chloe Breyer Bridges Cultures Through Interfaith Work

by Susal Stebbins, SIT Graduate Institute student

The Rev. Chloe Breyer’s experiences with The Experiment in International Living and SIT Study Abroad have inspired her to embrace her own traditions and blaze new paths in international work. She was ordained as Episcopal priest in 2000 and now serves as Director of the Interfaith Center of New York, bridging not only disparate faith communities in the US and the world, but also a wide range of immigrant communities and civic leaders.

Chloe’s connection to World Learning began through her father, US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, who was an early participant in The Experiment in International Living, traveling to France in the 1950s. Chloe traced her father’s footsteps in the EIL France program more than 20 years later. But her interests drew her to expand her exploration to a vastly different continent and culture through SIT’s Study Abroad program in Tibet in 1990.“I had a lovely time in France,” Chloe notes, “but I didn’t share my father’s passion for French culture and language. My real love is Central Asia.”

In SIT’s Tibet program (based in Nepal with travels to Dharamsala, India, and Tibet), Chloe studied the Tibetan monastic debate tradition at Rumtek Monastery in Sikkim and met Tibetan leaders in exile, including the Dalai Lama. She took heed of the Dalai Lama’s observation that there are truths in all religions and “one can make the most contribution in the tradition of one’s own culture.” Although her family had not been active in the church, Chloe reflected on the values of her Anglican heritage and was confirmed Anglican in 1992. Five years later she began her studies at General Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. “That was an intercultural immersion experience!” says Chloe, so much so that she was moved to write a memoir about it. ‘The Close: A Young Woman’s First Year at Seminary’ was published in 2000, just after Chloe’s ordination. After seminary, Chloe went to work as Chaplain of the Cathedral School at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City, founding and directing the Cathedral Forums on Religion and Public Life featuring international scholars and clerics such as author Karen Armstrong and Michael Lapsley, Chaplain of the African National Congress and founder of the Healing and Memory Institute.

Chloe’s life was transformed on September 11, 2001. She was one of hundreds of religious leaders who ministered to victims, survivors, and their families at the site of the World Trade Center, at the morgue, and at memorial services. She quickly became involved with the organization‘9/11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows’.

SIT Study Abroad Students Participate as Election Observers in El Salvador

Three SIT students share with us their involvement in this historic experience. 

By Jessica Bashford, Writer/Editor, SIT Study Abroad
 

After twenty years of National Republican Alliance (ARENA) leadership, on March 15, 2009 El Salvador elected Mauricio Funes, lead candidate with the opposing political party, the Farabundo Marti Front for National Liberation (FMLN), to be the country’s next president. Students from the SIT Nicaragua: Revolution, Transformation, and Civil Society program arrived in El Salvador five days prior to the election to be trained as international election observers. 

“Through the Social Initiative for Democracy (ISD), we received our credentials and left for Cabañas, a department to the north of San Salvador on the Honduran border,” reported SIT students Courtney Turner, Emily Grady, and Katie LaRoque.  “As observers, we were instructed to pay close attention to the opening and closing of voting sites along with any suspicious activity throughout the day.”

In San Isidro, SIT students witnessed a dispute between Salvadoran election officials over fraudulent identification cards.  According to Turner, Grady, and LaRoque, “the FMLN representatives accused nearly ten people of posing as deceased members of their community in order to vote.” The students also observed an ARENA official tearing FMLN ballots during the counting process, which according to Salvadoran electoral law, would nullify the ballots; speculation ensued on whether the incident was intentional or accidental. 

Overall, however, SIT students felt such incidents were “isolated anomalies”, and “did not prevent the nation from successfully holding a democratic election.”

The day ended with SIT participants joining student reporters from Radio Victoria to celebrate, as they described, “the success of the civic process with our Salvadoran counterparts.”

View photos on World Learning’s Flickr site.

Alumnus of SIT Study Abroad Ghana: Arts and Culture Program Continues to Inspire

Inspired by Abraham Adzenyah, renowned Master Drummer and professor of music at Wesleyan University, Samuel Bathrick first traveled to Ghana in the Fall of 2002 on the SIT Ghana: Arts and Culture study abroad program to study drumming and dance. His Independent Study Project focused on spirit possession music and practices in the Blekete Shrines of Ghana’s Volta Region.

Enthralled by his experience abroad with SIT, he returned to Ghana in the summer of 2004 as a leader with the Experiment in International Living.  Sam also won Wesleyan University’s Christopher Brodigan Award, a grant for service work in Africa, which allowed him to return to Ghana following graduation as a volunteer English teacher in Madina, Accra. In Madina, Sam continued his study of Ghanaian traditional and contemporary drumming with Master Drummer Francis Akotuah among other artists based at the University of Ghana’s School for Performing Arts.

While teaching Junior High English in Ghana from 2004-2005, Sam worked with Ghanaian photographer Godwin Azameti to establish and co-facilitate the Zongo Junction Youth Photo Program, an after school initiative catering to Junior High students in the Zongo Community of Lybia Quarters. Sam and Godwin went on to co-found Deviwo Projects, a non-profit youth-media collective.  Deviwo Projects has organized exhibitions in Ghana and throughout the US; has published a book of student-generated photos and essays; and has established a high school scholarship fund that currently supports ten of the original student photographers. Through a partnership with the SNAP Foundation, Deviwo Projects continues to sponsor community-generated youth media workshops in Ghana.

From 2005-2006, Sam worked as a caseworker at O.P.E, a refugee-processing agency in Accra, where he interviewed and transcribed persecution histories of West African refugees from Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Ivory Coast, among others.

Today, Sam resides in New York City, working as a freelance writer, filmmaker, and teacher. He recently returned to West Africa with a crew from the Brooklyn-based production company Flatbush Pictures to produce a documentary on the workers of the Firestone Rubber Plantation in Liberia.  He currently teaches West African drumming to children of all ages at Brooklyn Friends School and is a percussionist in the NY-based mathrobeat-funk band “mamarazzi”.

Comparative International Education Society Conference – Days 3 and 4

Written by Jen Durben, Programs Officer, Child and  Youth Programs, World Learning

Children from World Learning's program in Ethiopia

Stimulating discussion continues to accompany each panel of the conference that World Learning attends.  Even as they adjourn, World Learning team members can be seen ushered out of the room as they connect with colleagues and keep the conversation torch lit.

 Berhanu Manallew and Ezra Simon were both fortunate to be placed on cohesive panels with interesting papers being presented.  Berhanu presented a stirring Obamaesque performance with field-infused flavor to a group that had several watchers of Ethiopia and OVC development projects.  Ezra was part of a panel that looked at educational quality issues in the Horn of Africa and Middle East.

Contacts have been made with several strategic donors, including OSI, the Hewlett Foundation, and the Oprah Foundation, as well as with sister NGOs.