Vida Abundante

Written August 31st

So the power has been going out a lot here so I haven’t had the ability to update in a while, plus I’ve been super busy. However, I’ll try to give you some more details about my life here.

Vida Abundante is the bilingual school I teach at. I think there are 5 locations; one here in La Unión, Gracias, somewhere in the north of Honduras I think, and two in Tegucigalpa. All are bilingual except one of the schools in Tegucigalpa. In English they are called Abundant Life Christian Schools (ALCS). Our school is the poorest one out of the 5 schools and seems to be considered the “project”, at least from what I can gather. I teach 7^th, 8^th and 9^th grade history and language, which gives me 54 total students. 9^th grade has 29 students, 8^th has 9 and 7^th has 16. All of my classes are taught in English. The 8^th graders have fantastic English, and so do most of the 9^th graders. The 7^th graders struggle a bit, but they’re trying. School starts at 7:20 and ends at 2:40. Each class is 40 minutes long. One thing that is much different here is that the teachers change classes, not the students.

I already explained in an earlier post that classes aren’t held everyday and that the 9^th grade class is the oldest class at the school. They are going to go up to 11^th or 12^th grade but aren’t sure yet. In Honduras students graduate after 11^th grade, but we’re on an American curriculum, so I think they’re still deciding what they’re going to do. My classroom was finally painted and finished the Friday AFTER classes started. I was able to teach in there all week, but it wasn’t finished until Friday morning. Go figure. I spend every morning with the 9^th graders for 20 minutes doing devotionals and then they go off to their other classes. Aside from the core classes they also take home economics, PE, Bible, Spanish language, Spanish civics and art. Also, every Monday the high schoolers (7^th-9^th grade) have an hour long devotional as a group.

Our principal here is really great! Mr. Perdomo doesn’t really speak any English but he really seems to genuinely care about the students and the teachers as well. It’s nice to have a really supportive administration. He believes in firm, strict rules that can occasionally be broken for individual students if it is in their best interest to do so. The other teachers are all really great too. They are really helpful and have answered my billion questions with a smile every time. They really are their own little family and seem to all get along really well. We have 11 teachers for the whole school, which goes from 1^st though 9^th grade.

The students are all really good kids so far. I haven’t really had any major issues with students. I have a few who like to talk a little too much, but I otherwise haven’t had any issues. It’s strange being here where I see my students EVERYWHERE. La Unión is a really tiny town, so I see my students at the store, church, the streets, everywhere. It’s kind of nice to get to know my students on a more personal level and build actual relationships with them. Despite how poor a lot of students are (many of them are sponsored by someone in Honduras or the US for $50 a month) and how many issues they might have at home with abusive or absent parents they really work hard and have done well so far. The curriculum here is incredibly difficult, even by American standards, so they have to study a ton. It’s good though, because it keeps them out of trouble. Before school started I met a few students out on the street or at people’s houses. When I asked them if they were ready for school to start they all answered with an emphatic “yes”. There’s not a whole lot to do here, so most of them actually enjoy being at school.

I really love it at Vida Abundante. Despite some problems such as not having books for the 9^th graders yet, I’ve been really happy with the school. I enjoy working with my students and have been really impressed by their knowledge and determination. The school is definitely the place you want to be if you want to actually make a difference, because given their situations most of these students statistically should not succeed. Also, very few students here graduate from high school in the public schools, and even fewer go to college. I’ve heard number such as out of a graduating class of 15 at the public high school maybe 2 go to college. Hopefully our first graduating class does much better than that.

Last week one of my 8^th grade students asked me if I was coming back next year. I said if everything worked out I would definitely consider it (I hope my parents aren’t reading this, and if they are, Dad, please don’t fly down and kill me). Every day I wake up in awe of the fact that this is my life. I make enough money to live just fine, and I love where I work. I enjoy working with my students and hope to get to know them much better throughout the year. My goal is to become more integrated into the community and really get to know more people. So yes, I honestly would come back for a second year. It’s not all roses and sunshine, but I can look past the lack of power and water a lot of the days because I love what I’m doing. Who knows what this year will bring and how I will feel at the end of it, but maybe I’ll become a more permanent member of La Unión.