{"id":2500,"date":"2011-03-15T01:05:00","date_gmt":"2011-03-15T01:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=2500"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:36:25","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:36:25","slug":"newspaper-article-published-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=2500","title":{"rendered":"Newspaper Article Published Today"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As part of my job, I write an article now and then for the local newspaper.\u00a0 Here is the original text – unfortunately, when they printed it today, the paper left off the information about the Starfish Kids website!\u00a0 Here’s what I wrote:<\/p>\n\n\n

\"\"\/
This picture taken by our friend, Beka Mech, was published with my article.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As the plane dropped low for landing, I peered out the window at thin cows nonchalantly grazing at the edge of the tiny runway and knew I was in a very different world.\u00a0 The plane pulled up alongside three broken down aircraft at the end of the runway and within a few minutes our eight-man mission team was inside the tin-roofed terminal waiting to be officially allowed into Haiti.<\/p>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 We came as guests of One Mission Society, a Greenwood headquartered agency which operates a Christian radio station, medical and dental clinics, and a seminary near Cap Haitien, a city of 200,000 (about 100 miles from earthquake-ravaged Port au Prince).\u00a0 My school had graciously freed me a few extra days over fall break to enable me to spend a week working with OMS in Cap Haitien.\u00a0 Yet I wasn\u2019t in Haiti as an educator, but primarily as a learner \u2026 and I received an eye-opening education.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I could write endlessly about Haiti and its sights (motor scooters carrying five passengers each!) and sounds (late night voodoo drums on the mountainside!) and smells (sugar cane distilleries and open sewers!).\u00a0 But since I write here as a teacher, I will limit my scope to the contrasts I noted between the Haitian and American education experience and the renewed attitude I brought back to my own classroom.<\/p>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 First, physical resources.\u00a0 The gulf between American educational facilities and those of Haiti couldn\u2019t be greater.\u00a0 As a teacher at Hauser, I already take our recent school-wide renovations for granted: the new field house, an auditorium and stage (with $50,000 worth of light and sound equipment), new lighting in the halls, and an expanded gym, among other things.\u00a0 If the new HVAC system is off by a degree or two, we complain!<\/p>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Haitian schools, on the other hand, are doing well to have a concrete floor, an open window allowing air to move, some makeshift desks and a blackboard.\u00a0 You see, Haiti has not yet established a public school system; it is pay-as-you-go. The forty to sixty dollars parents pay each semester is hardly enough to keep the doors open and pay a teacher; computers, air conditioning, and even overhead lighting are undreamed of luxuries in most Haitian schools.\u00a0 Some \u201cschools\u201d are nothing more than children gathered around a solar-powered radio to listen to morning lessons on the OMS station.<\/p>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Given the vast differences in facilities, here\u2019s the really startling contrast between Haitian and American education:\u00a0 the Haitian students, all tidily dressed in their uniforms, seem eager \u2013 and even joyful- to be in school. American students, meanwhile, provided with top-notch technology and facilities, often complain endlessly about school. This seems a strange paradox until you consider that in Haiti, over half the population lives on an income of less than $1.25 per day.\u00a0 As a result, only 50% of grade school aged children are enrolled in any school!\u00a0 As is often the case, the more one has to fight and scrape for something, the more it is ultimately valued. \u00a0On my final day in Haiti, a friend and I were approached by a local teenager who begged desperately for $40 so he could return to school and finish the semester.\u00a0 (It\u2019s not uncommon to hear American high schoolers wish aloud that they could be PAID to attend school.)<\/p>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I returned to my Hauser classroom in late October with my head and heart full.\u00a0 As a teacher, I decided to make every effort to appreciate my surroundings and resources all that much more and to complain less \u2013 much less!\u00a0 Also, at every turn, I try more than ever to remind complacent students of the limitless opportunities they have been provided.\u00a0 My overall attitude in the classroom now is this: \u00a0shame on us \u2013 teachers, students, parents, and politicians alike \u2013 if we don\u2019t strive to consistently make the best use of America\u2019s incredible educational resources.<\/p>\n\n\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>On a final note, while I work on my attitude here, I also feel compelled to offer a helping hand to our neighbors to the south.\u00a0 If the plight of undereducated Haitian children creates in you, too, a desire to share some of your abundance, OMS operates a sponsorship program where your monthly donation of $25 can put a child in school and provide at least one nutritious meal a day. \u00a0For details, go to starfishkids.org.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span>************<\/span><\/span><\/span>I was bummed when I looked in the paper this morning and noticed the Starfish Kids website had been chopped off.\u00a0 But the cool thing is, that tonight I got a call from a random stranger in town here to ask for more information – she said she had been praying for Haiti and she wanted to do something financially!\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span>It’s pretty time consuming to write these newspaper articles, but if a Haitian kid gets an education as a result, how\u00a0awesome is that??<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As part of my job, I write an article now and then for the local newspaper.\u00a0 Here is the original text – unfortunately, when they printed it today, the paper left off the information about the Starfish Kids website!\u00a0 Here’s what I wrote: \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As the plane dropped low for landing, I peered out the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2501,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2500"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2502,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2500\/revisions\/2502"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}