1984

There is a quote from Mr. Orwell that says this:

“It was not by making yourself heard but by staying sane that you carried on the human heritage.”

I usually agree to maintain my sanity rather than making myself heard. But there are occasions when I must make myself heard to keep my sanity, and therefore carry on the heritage. I'm not totally sure what this heritage might be, but that's erroneous to this story. We have reached such a time when logical inversion of Mozambique has defied my understanding, and therefore prevented my voice being heard. Unfortunately this means I will briefly rant. Bear with me.

As the trimester draws to a close, it means we (we being most pc volunteers in Moz, but more specifically referring to Adam and me) have just finished up a week of proctoring provincial exams. The provincial exams are an attempt to standardize the curriculum across the province for all disciplines. But there are some flaws: flaws in the curricula, flaws in the testing, flaws in the testing policies. In chemistry, the curriculum is far too advanced, expecting complex concepts to be covered in 45 minutes, as students with no science background before 8^th grade catching on and applying this info. To offset these glaring issues, I have opted to (try to) hammer in scientific fundamentals and fall behind in the curriculum.

And the testing…. Well, the testing last year was a bit… disorganized. But this year, our school decided to crack down on cheating. The only issue is they still didn’t give consequences to cheating. I could tell my kids not to talk, not to look at others’ exams, or to use notebooks, but I had nothing to hold over their heads to give weight to my words. So the result is that the teachers got yelled at a lot this past week for allowing cheating, when in reality we had no way to stop it. The final emotional toll from standing impotently in front of a classroom of students talking during an exam (my soul died more than a little every time I stepped foot in a testing room) is nearly too much. However, the exercise in futility that is trying to tell the provincial big wigs that they’re doing it wrong is too much. So I opted for sanity, and a captive audience in America.

It is heartening to see them try to fix the holes in the education system here. Now if only they would start at the beginning with some baby steps. Baby steps to discourage cheating. Baby steps to increase basic science knowledge. Baby steps to transform these provincial exams from a joke to legitimate.