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What does an education PCV do during the summer?

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Summer vacation is a time of joy to teachers and students alike. However, what does a Peace Corps Volunteer do during the summer? This summer has been packed full of activities, travel, and planning. Here is an account of a few of my summer activities My Host Brother Eighth grade graduation was on the 2nd of June. It was full of smiles, laughter, beautiful songs, and happy parents. My oldest host brother graduated and received marmars and leis made out of chocolate, candy, dollars, and toiletries. Graduation is a large community event and it was great to see the hundreds of people that came to celebrate the ~50 graduating eighth graders. The week after graduation was the 70th anniversary of the people of Malem’s forced evacuation to Tafunsak by the Japanese during the Second World War. My host family took the Malemites (people from Malem) in 70 years ago and thus was a part of the celebrations. We attended church services, marched, and competed in canoe races. I was lucky enoug
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Rising Waters and Forgotten Nations

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For many Americans Climate Change is not something that is thought about everyday. It is not something that is currently affecting their lives. In Micronesia it affects everything. Communities on low lying coral islands or atolls will soon have to move off their islands, their family’s home for generations, because it will be flooded and will become part of the ever expanding Pacific Ocean. Since arriving in Micronesia a little over 14 months ago I have experienced a severe drought, flooding, and higher king tides than ever before. I have heard first hand of what is happening in small coral islands. One of my fellow Peace Corps volunteers told me how the ocean, at high tide, was flooding his island’s taro patch. For those of you who do not know taro is a staple in this region and is a major part of the diet. Losing an island’s taro patch, especially an outer island’s patch, is a huge blow to food security and preventing malnutrition. In February this year the majority of my communi
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Home Is Where Your Heart Is

The question where are you from has always been my least favourite question. In my 11 months on this island when people ask me “Kom Mwet Oyac?” I always answer I’m from Ohio or “Nga Mwet Ohio”. Whilst, at least according to my driver’s license, this is true; I have never lived in Ohio for longer than 3 months at a time. So where am I from? This is a complicated question as my mother is American and my father is Irish. I myself had lived in 7 different countries by the time I was 19. I do not necessarily consider myself to be from one place. Instead I consider myself to be an amalgamation of all of the different places I have lived in.  Another common question I get asked is “So where is home”? To borrow a common phrase “Home is where your heart is”. My heart belongs to so many places. London, Akron, Ennistymon, Algiers, Richmond Indiana to name just a few. Kosrae, however, has also stolen a part of my heart. Whilst there have been ups and downs during my time on this island I am so g
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Disaster Preparedness

When you live on an island that is 5 degrees north of the equator this is in the middle of the Pacific Ocean it’s important that you have a plan incase of typhoons, tsunamis, earthquakes, and fires. During my 8 months on island there have been 3 tsunami alerts, flooding, and extremely high tides that damaged properties. Luckily no one was hurt during these events but it goes to show how important it is to prepare for natural disasters. Recently I have been working with a counterpart from my school to update the school’s natural disaster preparedness plan. The previous plan was out of date and did not have protocols such as rosters and evacuation maps. The plan was also in English, which is a big problem as, statewide; students do not begin to learn English until the 3rd grade. The first thing we wanted to do was to create a roster that each teacher would have in their classroom. This roster would have a list of students in their grade sorted by grade level. As the schools records had
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Dog's Head

The 4th prompt for blogging abroad is On the Road. I decided that I would write about a unusual experience that I’ve had in Kosrae. One day I was staying at home to do some background research for a project I wanted to do with my students. My host family was out visiting their family members in another area of the island. One of my host uncles came around to the house and he looked really guilty when I answered the door. He asked me in Kosraean where my host family was. I responded that they were out of the house. I saw that he was holding a pot and asked him if he wanted me to give it my host family.  My Uncle looks down at the pot, up at me, and then back down at the pot. He slowly hands it to me. At this point I look down and see a cooked dog’s head, with eyes, tongue, and teeth still inside it, on top of a plate of breadfruit. He looks me straight in the eyes, says I’m so so so so so sorry, and walks away. *If anyone would like to see a picture of it shoot me a message*
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