FIRST IMPRESSIONS IV

TEACHING

The Tanzanian system of secondary education is as complicated, cumbersome, and ineffective as anything I've ever experienced, and I've seen a bit of Washington, D.C. from the inside. A committee of almost infinite size must have produced it, with each member introducing a regulation guaranteed to hamper student learning. In fact, I suspect it, like so much else in this country, was developed by former President Nyerere as part of his special self-reliance version of socialism. Mwalimu (Teacher), as newsletter headlines routinely refer to him, is still highly admired here, at least by those older leaders whose active lives have been spent working in the structure he invented. I can only guess what the students think, but I have guessed.

Monday morning, October 5, I came down the hill from my house, provided by the school but still lacking the bedding and gas cooker which were to have been moved in for me two months ago, to find the morning parade–the students line up in the main school yard a few minutes before 7:30 when classes are scheduled to begin–being addressed with unusual vigor by the headmaster, a man who speaks with dignified power even when entertaining in his own home. From my distant vantage point I couldn't be certain, but I thought his sentences were alternating between English and Kiswahili, with the louder, more animated sections being delivered in the latter language. The only thing I could make out for sure was that at 11:15 that morning, after tea break, there was to be a general assembly and probably no more classes for the day. My only concern was that it was the weakest of my three streams of physics students who would thus miss 30% of their week's work and get even farther behind; a major part of the system here is a set syllabus rigidly enforced by national exams that largely determine the students' futures. Things worked out pretty well the next day, however, when their biology teacher failed to show up for class, and I extended mine for as long as anyone cared to work on physics. Missing classes is very standard on the part of many teachers.

The assembly took place in what I'll call a theater, with an elevated stage; it’s located in the most substantial building on campus. Damaged in an earthquake a few years ago, the building itself has been restored, but funds are not yet available to finish the stage floor properly and to buy chairs for the audience, so drama and concerts have been postponed indefinitely. The boys, some 800 strong, plus the 50 girls from the Arusha area, who are day students in a trial program that is being discontinued, lined up smartly just outside the building. It was a warm sunny morning, and they looked sharp in their white shirts (blouses) and black pants (skirts). And when they smile, which happens frequently, the pearly teeth sparkling against an ebony background seem to enhance their obvious happiness.

At someone's signal they began filing into the hall, moving briskly and orderly into the positions indicated by their student prefects, and when the faculty walked onto the stage they greeted us with loud rhythmic clapping. Then, when they sang what I suppose is the school song, again against a background of clapping, even I–or maybe only I–felt a tug of emotion. There were chairs on the platform for the faculty, but of course the students stood–the room is too small for the number of chairs needed even if they were moved from the classrooms. It was then announced that today the students would practice democracy by electing their leaders for the coming year, and I could easily understand why the emotional energy in the room was so intense that the walls could scarcely contain it. After explaining how the voting would proceed, the headmaster had the names of the candidates read, and they then walked from their places and stood at the front of the stage. Finally they were allowed to introduce themselves and make campaign speeches. The headmaster had somehow planned to finish 30 such speeches in 15 minutes or less total, and naturally the students in the audience wanted to, and did, cheer and applaud their favorite candidates. For a while it appeared we might be there an hour or two. Finally, after threats by several officials failed to dampen student enthusiasm, the second master, who is the main disciplinarian in Tanzanian education, delivered, in Kiswahili, a promise of punishment serious enough to quiet the students a bit, and the speeches were completed. But the headmaster felt compelled to deliver some stinging remarks including the charge that the students had acted like animals and would be treated as such, before he ordered them out of the building on the double. He then turned to us on the stage and remarked, “Well, I wanted to see how quickly we could empty the building.”

I teach three streams of students, each in its own room, and I was just this day designated the form teacher for one of them, a responsibility that I'll describe later. Those students then returned to their room where I conducted the election and, with the assistance of four of them, counted their ballots. While they were still assembling, I commented to the early arrivers, “Democracy is fragile, treat it gently.” They smiled, knowingly. Despite the threats, insults, canings, pulled ears, forced exercises, and meaningless tasks reminiscent of fraternity hazings, their spirits remain bright and their dispositions sweet; they are basically good, young men.

The second master, on the contrary, is the personification of evil and malevolence; if that's redundant, it's intended. He stands about six feet six inches tall, is maybe ten inches wide and perhaps three inches thick. Sadly, this near one-dimensionality in physical stature is matched by the narrowness of his character and the viciousness of his purpose. On many occasions, and believe me I avoid the man, I have unintentionally observed him abusing students, usually verbally and psychologically rather than physically, although a stick is omnipresent in his right hand, and the temptation has been strong to knock the spindly mentality off its spindly legs. Off course I won't. I am very puzzled, however, to understand how the administration thinks such practice can benefit its students' educations. That very afternoon, in response to my stern but polite written note, Mr. Chagga delivered my bedding; the gas cooker remains a promise for the indefinite future. The Peace Corps did give us each a two-burner electric hotplate, so when there is electricity, I can have coffee in the morning and a hot main meal, courtesy of my housekeeper, in midafternoon.

On Tuesdays I have classes only during three periods, all before the 11:00 tea break, so that is my favorite day to do errands in town; it's an easy hour's walk each way. I patiently waited on campus for the 85 minutes between the second and third of these periods only to find that my class had been assigned some kind of work; they were all standing around the campus woodpile watching one of their colleagues wield an axe. I went on to town without further delay, so I don't know if they spent their entire time there taking turns with the one axe or what. Sawing and cutting of logs are essential since the campus kitchen uses wood-burning stoves; it's a veritable witches' brew of steaming cauldrons filled with beans, rice, or porridge. I'm entitled to a free lunch in the faculty room, but the food my housekeeper prepares, although emphatically Tanzanian and essentially unvarying, is far superior; I'll see that the quality is improved and the variety expanded as we get better acquainted. Also, after four to six hours with students, except on Tuesdays, I'm more than ready for a quiet meal.

It was my form class that I missed on Tuesday, and since they are the farthest along, it didn't matter that much. I had just reached the main highway, the midpoint of my walk to town, when I was hailed by a passing van occupied by three PC colleagues; they had two boxes for me, one of books and the other containing my computer printer, that had made it from Seattle to Arusha, with a stop en route in Dar, in just over a month. How nice to have those materials and also to see some friends, if only for a short while. The day in town was a bit of an anticlimax.

Wednesday was quite remarkable. All three classes met for at least their assigned periods, and we made very good progress. I have adopted their style of instruction with only faint hope that later they will adapt to mine. This involves putting a few notes on the board that they copy verbatim, briefly discussing those ideas, and then doing a very simple derivation or calculation; finally I write a many-step problem on the board for them to copy and work on at their seats. Only then can I interact with them individually, helping them a little and ascertaining their backgrounds and abilities. We are beginning to work together somewhat effectively, and I believe that I now have their confidence. It is hard even for me to realize, but remember I'm really still in my second week of full-time work at my assigned position!

Thursday started off well, although I was a bit suspicious about the future when I noticed one of my streams working in the gardens; I recognize my students without difficulty, including many of the sixth-formers on whom I practiced, but I don't yet know which individuals belong to which group. Sure enough, when I reached their room at the appointed period a little later, I found it empty and locked. By now I was beginning to wonder about the entire arrangement–I remember muttering “They're out of their cotton-picking gourds”–as I starting inquiring of other teachers I know a bit, if any advance notice was given of these class cancelations. They had little to offer other than to suggest that I ask the two “teachers on duty.” We each get that special assignment, which I'm certain disrupts our teaching even further, about one week a term; I'll tell you all about it after my first experience in the position next week. Those two knew nothing, so I started across campus. I came upon another of the more senior teachers whom I know a bit and respect; he spent about five years in the US some time ago, studying at Concordia and Dekalb to earn a master's degree in mathematics and had spoken to me recently with considerable enthusiasm about his life then in and near Chicago. He sympathized with my distress and informed me that today those students were the “class on duty” and would miss most, perhaps all, of their classes. That meant they were simply to be available for any special errands that might be required; I observed them a little later sitting on the hillside doing nothing. To my colleague I muttered–I suspect it was actually louder than a mutter, but controlled nonetheless–“I didn't come all this way just to watch my students chop wood. But I guess I'll just have to adapt to the Tanzanian system or go home.” “Don't leave,” he said, “I'll see what I can do.” Nothing could be done that day, of course, and those students missed another 20% of their weekly class time for a grand total of 50%, but I suspect he may have made a change in the next day's agenda, as you shall read.

It was on the way up the hill to spend my unexpected two free hours that I discovered the marvelous old kitchen; there's a bakery next to it, but that door was closed and locked. The bread that usually accompanies our morning tea is baked there, and it's not bad, quite a bit better than the overly sweet tea, as a matter of fact. I was standing in a nearby building that is now totally unused when my friend Chagga–I don't even mention the gas cooker any more–came by and told me it had been the original dining room. When the school was built by the German Lutheran Church, it accommodated about 200 students; it was expanded to its present size about thirty years ago, I think, and the Lutherans had about 600 students then. Since the government took over in 1971, according to Chagga, another 200 students have been added. Not all of the faculty housing was turned over to the government, however, so there is quite a bit of sharing now. One of the houses retained by the church, right next to the school chapel, is presently being used by a couple from Bellevue, a city across Lake Washington from Seattle, while they spend a year preparing devotional materials for translation into Kiswahili.

I enjoyed the two hours at home and only came back down for tea because the power was off, and I couldn't make coffee. It was during this tea break that I learned of the meeting that afternoon of form teachers with the headmaster. So, after lunch I came back down again. He was in a serious mood, but, as always, he spoke in a positive vein. In his view the school was in serious difficulty, “in a deep pit,” he said, and it would take much extra effort on the part of the faculty, particularly the form teachers, to restore it to its former place as the nation's best. I know from experience that it is still widely thought to be that good, but it was obvious to me the first day I spent on campus that it was in trouble. The potential for improvement, and this is what Mr. Mtui stressed, lies with the fifth formers who arrived in July; they have the best entrance scores of the many students who took the national exams. Unless they do well at the end of form six on the national tests, Ilboru has probably had it. Rumors are widespread that the government already is asking the Lutherans to resume operation of the school. Mr. Mtui concluded, after the usual complaining about the boys not watering their garden patches, picking up litter on the grounds, and keeping the buildings clean, with the plea that each of us spend time outside of class, late afternoons, evenings, weekends, working with, befriending, and counseling his or her form students. As I walked back up the hill for the third time that Thursday, I wondered when the boys had time for anything extra with all that was already scheduled for their school day.

Friday is the only morning my classes don't begin, I mean aren't scheduled to begin at 7:30, so this morning, October 9, I walked down a little before 8:00 and was just standing around when Chagga told me that Mr. Mtui wanted to talk with me. He had two favors to ask: first, he wanted my help in beginning to establish a science exhibit area or museum, a place where the students could come outside of class hours and work with demonstration apparatus or look at special exhibits, etc.; the space he had in mind was part of the old dining hall that I had “discovered” the previous day. The second matter involved the incoming group of PC trainees, who will spend some time at Ilboru during the first two weeks of January, just before they go to Dar for their final week of training. He asked me to act as local host; naturally I agreed, even if it means curtailing travel. Ilboru will get another PC teacher, a chemist, in late January; that individual will almost certainly share the house in which I live. Before leaving, I asked him to verify that these fifth-form students really were that much better than the sixth-form group I had met in August, and he enthusiastically concurred. And then I asked, “Do they really have time for extra activities with all the additional work that gets scheduled?” He replied with his typical engaging smile, “Oh, there are always ways to get around regulations.”

I was more than a little exhilarated as I walked back toward my classroom, and I was neither surprised nor too disappointed to find that yet again my class, the third different one in three days, was doing outside work. This time, however, they really were working, and when I asked if they would be missing class, I was told that they would finish in ten minutes. Perhaps my chat the previous day did have an effect. In fact their elected class leader–he's called the monitor–came to get me while I was still standing outside in the warm morning sun: “Please sir, we're ready now.” I quickly finished the physics for the week, and then we just chatted about school life in general. They seem quite interested in meeting outside class and agreed to give me times and possible activities next week. Our first eight days together have gone well.

A class teacher unsurprisingly teaches a subject to a class of students; I am this three times over. A form teacher is in addition the counselor and surrogate parent to his one form class. In addition he is supposed to see that they water their garden patch, keep their classroom and the surrounding area clean and tidy, and so on. That at least is the Tanzanian educational philosophy. It will take much more time to see how it all really works. The two classes of mine–I'm also form teacher for one of them–who are studying physics, chemistry, and mathematics (PCM) all want to go on to university and become engineers. Unhappily, despite their being the country's most capable students, as evidenced by their test scores, only a few will find space in the country's one university. Right now the budget at Ilboru is so tight that the students don't even get sugar on their porridge. The third class is studying physics, chemistry, biology (PCB), and an applied mathematics course; I don't know them quite so well, but I think many of them hope to become doctors, and their chances of getting into university aren't very promising either, simply because of limited space.

But this is now the week that I took on a third role, that of teacher on duty (TOD), a function that two teachers fill together for one week. The assignment rotates among the faculty and should come my way only about once a term. It was to begin on Sunday evening, and in response to my inquiry of what I should do, my fellow TOD, the chairman of the math department and a person I both admire and respect, told me to look for him on campus around 6:00. I had coffee with American friends–he was born here of Lutheran missionary parents, and they met when both were students at Montana State University in Bozeman–across the road from the school just before that, so it was no effort to look for him on the way back up the hill. I couldn’t find him, of course, and since the students seemed to be going about their affairs quite happily, I concluded that my responsibilities had been discharged fully and well and so continued on home.

The next morning I arrived at parade around 7:30 to find the headmaster well turned out in a brown suit and delivering what so far in my experience is his longest and most impressive monologue. Both languages were used freely and emphatically, but the gist of it was that the government's penury forced the students to pay more of their own expenses, including their fares home at term's end; the sugar shortage was also mentioned. It is a mark of the man's oratorical powers that his jokes, in Kiswahili regrettably, evoked roars of laughter despite the seriousness of the talk's main theme. My sole responsibility as a TOD that Monday morning was to visit each classroom to ascertain its state of cleanliness and order and of course to record my findings on a mimeographed form. Either the Lutherans were using very antiquated equipment when they left in 1971, or they took the good stuff with them; the mimeograph machine here makes the parsonage model I remember from boyhood look ultramodern, and the switchboard in the main office is right out of a turn-of-the-century movie. It's all pretty silly, but the students seem to enjoy the encounters, and now all of them have seen me at short range a few times.

By Tuesday morning I was confident that I could do an adequate inspection even dressed in US Marine blues, so I didn't hesitate to take on another awesome responsibility, that of issuing passes for upwards of fifty students to go downtown. Most of them had slips from the dispensary–a nurse comes from town each morning–authorizing visits to the hospital, but another pass and an entry in the pass record book are required; it turns out that there is also another book in which faculty members are expected to register their visits to town, another procedure I'll continue overlooking. My colleague keeps insisting there is nothing else I need do, and since it's very impolite to argue with a department chairman, I can only accede to his wishes. So I've only missed about one period of teaching on each of these days. Oh, I almost forgot, a gas cooker was brought to the house this morning. It lacks an oven door among other obvious defects, and I'm not certain that the kitchen is improved by its presence; perhaps Peter Jackson can give me an opinion. I also discovered that the substantially larger and more modern house originally intended for my use has been turned over to the second master. Bummer. But I do have a much better view of Mt. Meru than he does.

I think the nurse must have been late on Wednesday, for there was no lineup of sick students at 7:45. So I taught for about an hour and then made my rounds of classrooms. It was during the third period, which runs from 8:55 to 9:35, that I made a rather surprising discovery. I distinctly dislike walking into a class in progress, so I was quite pleased, at first, to find the classrooms occupied by students but without any teachers present. A few rooms were vacant, but I supposed those students were doing a practical somewhere. The dirtiest room I've seen is the classroom in which I did my “practice” teaching; on Monday when I came in to inspect it, I was quickly urged to leave by my colleague, because it was officially listed as a laboratory and therefore not subject to inspection, or to being kept clean for that matter. When I finished I realized that I had encountered only one teacher, and that one was a volunteer, a woman from Japan who teaches math. Back in the TOD office I checked the class schedule on the wall and counted twenty-one classes that were to meet that period. Tanzanian education does have its problems. Today, Thursday, I must do some business in town; I worry much about missing my two PCM classes.

The last class that I met, right after tea break, on the Friday that ended my first eight days of full-time teaching here, did not go nearly so well as the earlier one, but those students and I had spent a previous hour or two in informal discussion, so perhaps we were already adequately acquainted. Many of them did stay on after class, however, to look over a few American textbooks I had brought down the hill. It was then that a student from another group came in to remind me that the last two periods on Friday are reserved for religious activities. Thinking that these were optional, voluntary, I indicated that everyone was certainly free to leave. It turns out that religious activities on Fridays are compulsory, but many students stayed on to chat until I was ready to leave. If they prefer physics to religion, they're my kind of guys. And that chemist who may share the house in which I'm living? Something like that happened to me once before, and it worked out very well indeed.

W. Vance Johnson

15 Oct 92