As I sit on my couch with a cup of coffee after a good night’s sleep, I am overwhelmed with emotion and urge to express my feelings of incredible pride for the work of these students. Everything we had envisioned for this trip came to life and exceeded our expectations for the emotional growth and the immensely important ‘learning’ component of service learning.
As FSW teachers we have certain expectations at school and then we ask students to be ambassadors and represent us well in the community and beyond. I cannot even begin to describe how amazing it was to see this in every single moment when we were out of Wilmington. Even though on flights I was towards the back with students grouped together in the middle of the plane, every flight crew stopped me to say how great these kids were (and then proceeded to give them extra snacks!). They were described as having a “pure energy and kindness” that clearly stood out from other travelers and even beyond many other school/missions groups, according to flight staff. One even asked if he could adopt them. 🙂
When in the Dominican Republic our students were like magnets for Dominican children, not just because they were new and exciting, but because they approached every situation with such warmness, huge smiles, and confidence. Though all of our planned activities (painting, art classes, and excursions) were wonderful, it was the part that I couldn’t have planned that touched me the most – simply playing together. During down time in Villa Liberacion, students learned fun handshakes with the kids, they taught Dominican children card games, Cameron played a hilarious game of “roll the marble into the plastic cup” with 5 years olds, Ross played a pretty intense game of basketball with teenagers, and more. At FSW, teachers value the role of play for middle school students, but I hadn’t thought about its role in our trip. This happened naturally, and I’m confident that a lot of the most memorable moments happened during these times. In the evenings, FSW students needed their own release after such hard days of work, hot sun, and language overload. Their way of relaxing was playing marco polo in the pool, rolling in the sand and searching for huge conch shells, floating in the ocean, playing many (and I really mean many) card games together, and for many of the girls, having aromatherapy massages before bed. Yes, I got a lot of massages!
And then there’s the language. 🙂 The desire to interact with Dominican kids was so strong, that students just went for it and tried their best to communicate. I loved it! Of course I was there to translate and bring the conversation to the next level, but these low key impromptu conversations have boosted student confidence in the language immensely. Just hearing students create language on their own to explain to the kids that we were leaving for the hotel, we would be back to paint tomorrow, see you tomorrow, etc. was SO important. And then, even more so than producing the Spanish language, the amount that they have heard is so much, to the point of students needing to tune it out occasionally to conserve brain power. 🙂 Students have also seen how difficult it can be to understand country specific slang and phonetic patterns including that Dominicans rarely use the letter “s” when speaking. “¿Cómo etá?” “Gracia amigo” (even if talking to multiple friends) “¿Habla ingle?” (even if using the Tú form of our verb conjugations) and more.
The number one thing I had learned in my Global Service Program training was to make sure you trust the organization you are working with, and DREAM Project made that easy! This is an incredible organization that is making a HUGE sustainable difference in the Dominican Republic. I am so happy with our experience working with DREAM Project and I am so pleased to know that we can continue to build on our relationship with them. Jon, Otto, Salvador, McKinny (Nube Negra) and Rigo along with our Peace Corps volunteer and the DREAM director Catherine, took such great care of us. I couldn’t have asked for more.
Really, we all took care of each other, just as it should be. Yes, there was exhaustion and there was homesickness at the beginning of the trip. Yes, some had stuffy noses. Yes, almost all had some sort of stomach issue with quick recovery time. We were there for each other and took care of each other. Still, our hearts and minds were focused on what mattered most, which was the community of Villa Liberacion. As I expressed with tears to the students during our Meeting for Worship on the beach, I am so proud of these students and this week will stay in my heart forever.
Cameron, thank you. You and I make a great team!
