Are you ready? You've had a year.

 14 August 2022

This time last year I attended the welcome orientation for the 2021 cohort of DAT participants.  Of the twenty teachers chosen, all except two of us have completed their exchanges and many went in January of this year.  Given that I had extra time to prepare, I had grandiose ideas of having my preliminary research complete, a literature review written and a body so fit that I'd be cast as an extra in a Bollywood film. 

Needless to say, I've accomplished none of these.  However I have spent a significant amount of time thinking globally about education and policy, learning about the effects colonialism on education, connecting the dots between patriarchy and disparity, and exploring NGO school projects working to provide opportunities to underserved students.   I got married to ease the paperwork of the visa process.  It didn't work (the paperwork, not the marriage), but it gave me a reason to reconnect with some of the most important people in my life - my high school friends.  

I also spent this year participating in the most engaging and empowering professional development experience of my career.  To support us in our projects, Fulbright and IREX provide a US based faculty advisor who conducts monthly presentations introducing us to methods of research and identifying specific needs to fulfill our projects.  It sounds dry, but it's not!  We discuss differences in the cultures we'll experience, ways to determine educational needs and have space bring our individual expertise.  While I'm bringing a rural Alaska perspective, fellow cohort members are bringing experiences from New York, LA, Arkansas, Colorado - each of us feeling a bit overwhelmed, yet refreshed and excited.  During one breakout session a colleague asked, "Why do you think this feels so different from PDs in our districts?".  The only response I had was that they are treating us like the graduate-level professionals we are.  Imagine if teachers were regularly given the time to read the research that exists and given the support and resources to apply it directly in their own classrooms?  

I spent some time trying to learn Hindi.  Ankita, my tutor, was wonderful but I could tell that my inability to memorize the 40+ characters and sounds was disappointing.  I have learned a few phrases and the process has been humbling.  I frequently think about how difficult it would be to immigrate to country where you don't know the language and how privileged I am to be a native English speaker.    

So with one week to departure, I'm spending my time with binder of articles (yes I'm old), a couple of books and a Google doc trying to synthesize my resources.  I'm also figuring out all the tech advances of traveling with a phone and the possibility cell service abroad, updating security on my devices and generally trying to navigate the bureaucracy of the Indian government. 

In Alaska some things are oddly easy and oddly difficult, so I think in some ways the last six years has been great training for what's to come.