Global Education

Education is our most important resource we, as the human race, choose to continue to progress and evolve. Without a thirst for knowledge and understanding… what would make us human? Without education, how do we advance? I feel that education is one of the beautiful institutions that reminds us and shows us the hypocrisy when we manipulate its beauty for profit and greed. It shows us how in many places in the world, it is not taken for granted, often cherished, and highly respected.
Education is sometimes our only tool to combat hate and fight poverty. Why should those with wealth and power be able to distribute education? When students around the world are craving for an education, fighting against all odds to learn, why do we as Americans take our education for granted? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that every American kid in the United States takes their education for granted. And I know the education system in the U.S. is broken. Many public schools are beyond understaffed and undersupplied at best. My complaint is with the kids, who are given almost every resource imaginable; who act like it’s a burden to receive an education. It’s not ‘cool’ to be smart, so slack and goof off. It doesn’t matter, you’ll learn what you learn, make your way through school, that’s good enough right?
Every Tuesday and Thursday, for probably an hour and half, Cait, Sarah and I are going to go to a school to teach the kids English and sing some songs with them. We have only gone once so far, but I want to share my experience of this school. When we first arrived at the school, we thought that we were just going to help out the teachers with their lessons, but the teachers wanted us to sing some songs with the kids in each class. When you think of classroom full of kids, how many do you think of? 20? 30? Try about 50 in each of the three classrooms. One teacher for each of the classrooms. So three teachers (one who was the principal) for about 150 kids ranging from 3 to 8. This younger group of kids goes to school from 8-12, and the older kids, from ages 8 to 12 go to school after siesta. There is no room for all of the ages to be at school at once.
I have read about many places around the world where there aren’t even buildings to house classrooms, so I know that they were lucky at least in that aspect. They had a building, they had chalkboards, they had uniforms, and desks. But could a school ever exist like that in the United States or Europe? If that was the school your child had to go to everyday, would you find that acceptable? Or is it only acceptable because it is in Equatorial Guinea?
The thing that struck me the most was the openness of all of the kids. Here were three white girls who speak very limited Spanish, standing in front of a classroom. We were singing “Row, row row your boat” and the “Hokey Pokey” in Spanish that Cait and I wrote for a dialogue in Spanish 202. Every single kid participated, every single kid showed us respect, and every kid was excited for us to be there. My favorite part was when they sang and danced their own version of the Hokey Pokey while we tried our best to follow the dance. We did 3 times. It took 30 minutes to go through the three classrooms. We were so blown away by all of the friendliness and hospitality that we forgot to introduce ourselves, but there is next Tuesday for that. I am beyond excited to continue to visit the school, play games, teach things like animals and body parts in English, and just to have a great time with the kids.
You could tell how appreciative of us they where, even though I have a sneaking suspicion that I will be getting a lot more out of this than what I can possibly give to the kids. It was so refreshing and joy-filled to see the kids so happy and eager to learn. In spite of all the setbacks these kids face, they still want to go to school, they still want to learn. I have found that education is never taken for granted when you don’t know how much of an education you are going to receive.
Without education, what are we? By withholding education for those who desperately crave it, what does that make us? How can we honestly look around the world, see the horrible state of education in many countries, and accept it for what it is? We have the power to change the world through education. We have an almost unlimited amount of resources as Americans. When used properly, our money can have so much impact throughout many places in the world. If everyone read “Three Cups of Tea” and decided to take action, the world would be a better and more educated place.
It is our duty to spread the power of education. Education is an inherent right for anyone born on earth; it is not something to be withheld because of poverty or geography.


Without an education for all peoples, there is no way that peace can exist in our world.