District Science Fair

In Peace Corps there are various projects volunteers can be involved with in addition to their primary project.  For example, my primary project is teaching, but I can also participate in secondary projects.  The reading program I mentioned in my last post is one secondary project I am working on.  That project is funded through USAID, which is trying to improve early grade reading in Mozambique.  In Mozambique, there are also a few long-running projects funded by PEPFAR, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.  The four projects are REDES, JUNTOS, English Theater, and Science Fair.  I’ll talk more about REDES, JUNTOS, and English Theater in future posts, but now I’m going to talk about Science Fair.

Science Fair was originally started by Peace Corps volunteers in Mozambique to provide students with opportunities to get hands on science experience, since most science classes in Mozambique are taught without a laboratory component.  It is basically like a science fair in the states: students create projects and present them in front of judges at a fair.  There is also an emphasis on using recycled materials and other materials of low cost.  A few years ago the Mozambican government adopted the Science Fair program as part of their Ministry of Science and Technology.  There are currently four phases of the fair: school, district, provincial, and national.  Peace Corps volunteers work alongside government employees to realize the district, provincial, and national fairs.  There are two PCVs who are the National Coordinators and each province also has a PCV Provincial Coordinator.  In January, I was asked to be the Provincial Science Fair coordinator for Tete.  My responsibilities include working with the district and provincial representatives to realize the fairs and to facilitate travel to the national fair.  I accepted to the position, not really knowing what it would be like at all.

Since January, I have met with the government representatives a few times and things seemed to be moving along well.  I also tried to get some students in Zobue started on projects, but it was really difficult to explain what kind of projects were required.  With my Dad visiting in April and the school break in May, the date of district fair (May 17^th) was creeping up and I didn’t have any students with projects.  My options were to work really hard with a few students and basically do their projects for them so they would be ready for the fair or not to stress about it and make sure to start early next year preparing the students.  I decided on the latter.  Well, this was my first try mobilizing students and it didn’t go so well.  Now I know better what I need to do and next year will be better, I thought.  May 17^th came and went with no word about the district fair.  Then came a call from the district representative, Arsenio Amoda on May 22nd.  Let me walk you through what happened in the following two days after that phone call.

May 22^nd, 5pm

While I am walking home from school I get a call from Arsenio Amoda. 

Arsenio: Ola Sienna, tudo bem? Hi Sienna, everything good?

Sienna: Ola Arsenio, sim tudo bem como esta? Hi Arsenio, yes everything is fine. How are you?

Arsenio: Estou muito bem, obrigado.  Vamos realizar a feira distrital o sabado e estou a convidar a escolar secundaria de Zobue. I’m very well, thank you.  We are holding the district fair this Saturday and I would like Zobue Secondary School to participate.

Sienna: Esta Sabado? Ok obrigada, mas nao temos alunos com proyectos este ano.  This Saturday? Ok thank you, but we don’t have any students with projects this year.

Arsenio: Que? Nao tem? Porque nao? What? You don’t have any students with projects? Why not?

Sienna: Sim, desculpa, mas demoramos muito este ano. Yes, I’m sorry, but we were late this year.

Awkward silence….

Arsenio: Entao, eu vou falar com o director. Ok I will talk to the director.

Sienna: (realizing I just made a huge mistake because in Mozambique you never say no) Entao, tal vez posso falar com o professor Flavio a ver se ele tem algums alunos com proyectos. Well….I guess I could ask the physics professor Flavio if he has any students with projects.

Arsenio: Ta bom. Obrigado. Ok, thank you.

May 22^nd, 6pm

I call the physics teacher Flavio to see if he has any ideas.  He say we will meet at the school in the morning to figure something out.

May 23^rd, 8am

I get to the school and Flavio is not there.  I wait in the teacher’s lounge watching a cartoon about soccer players and a Brazilian news show about the bus strike in Rio de Janeiro, expecting him not to show up.

May 23^rd, 9 am

Flavio shows up, produces two “experiments” he has written up, grabs two unsuspecting students from a nearby classroom and tells them they are going to do science fair.  We spend the next two hours typing up the projects and explaining to the students what science fair is.

May 23^rd, 10:30 am

We break for the morning and tell the students to get their materials and meet back at the school at 3:30 pm to practice.

May 23^rd, 3:30 pm

I arrive back at the school and wait with one of the students for an hour until Flavio shows up so we can practice their presentations.  The second students shows up and says her father refuses to let her go to Moatize for the district fair the next day.  By this point, it is almost dark and all the students have gone home.  What are we going to do, Flavio asks? We need a student who can speak Portuguese.  I call Seni and ask if he wants to participate, but he has work to do on the farm the next day.  Finally we grab a small 9^th grade boy who has the bad luck of living next to the school.  He denies being able to speak Portuguese, but lets some Portuguese slip out so he is wrangled into coming with us.  We practice with the students for an hour and it is obvious they really need more time.  "Tonight you don’t sleep," Flavio says.  "You stay up until midnight and practice. I don’t want to be embarrassed."  The fair is in Moatize, about 2 hours away so we agree to meet at the chapa stop at 6am the next day.

May 24^th 6am Day of the Fair

Flavio and I walk to the chapa stop, but students aren’t there.  He runs up to the school in the rain to try and find them, while I stay and try to get the chapa to wait for us. They aren’t coming, I think.  They aren’t going to show up.  Fifteen minutes later the three of them appear.  Well, I guess we’re going, I think.  We pile into the chapa and take off.

9am

We arrive in Moatize and spend the day at the district fair.  I’m actually pretty impressed by how organized it is.  Granted, we start about 3 hours late, but they have judges, decorations, a schedule, speeches, theater presentations, and serve us both snack and lunch.  Since I am the Peace Corps coordinator I am expected to make a few comments at the beginning and end of the event.  I get a special spot to sit next to Arsenio.  There are 11 students from 4 schools participating.  Our students are the only ones not from the Moatize city area.  They are by far the least prepared, with the least command of Portuguese.  The winning projects include an electric kettle made of an old water jug, a model of a human lung using a disposable water bottle and balloons, and “therapeutic” salve.  Zobue’s two students are not among those who will move on to the provincial fair.

4pm

The fair ends and we head back to Zobue.

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So, that was my adventure with the District Science Fair.  From getting the call about the fair to returning back to Zobue on Saturday, only 48 hours passed.  While I wish our students had been better prepared and had more ownership of their projects, at least they got a free trip to Moatize and got to see what the Science Fair actually is.  Next year they will know more about what science fair entails and hopefully will want to participate again.  I can work with them earlier on to be better prepared.  Next year I also will have a better idea of what I am preparing them for, since I’ve now seen a district science fair myself.  While there are a lot of things I would have changed about how this district fair went, I think it was still a good experience.  I got to work closely with a fellow teacher and see how he interacts with students. I got to take a trip with some students and see how that all works.* As provincial coordinator, I will still be involved in planning the provincial fair in June and attend the national fair in Pemba in July.  I’m sure it will be full of more adventures.

*It is SO different than in the US.  No permission slips, no details about when we were returning.  When we got back to Zobue in the dark (it gets dark here so early now! Winter!) I was thinking about asking the students if they were ok walking home in the dark, but as we were getting off the chapa before I could ask THEY asked ME if I was ok walking home.  Kids here are so capable.

Our two Zobue participants: Monica and Salumao

A student from Moatize Escola Primaria Completa Samora Machel presenting her electric chaleira.

The theater group, OJM, doing a skit about how parents should allow their students participate in activities like science fair.  They also did a skit about not discriminating against people with HIV.

A student presenting a project about the conductivity of water.  This project was really cool and I thought it should have won.  Another side note: I don't think the judging of the fair was very objective/consistent/fair and some of the projects weren't based on the most sound science.  Things to work on for next year.