Peace Corps Elementary

This is in continuation of the concept of educational experimentation during my elementary school years in the 1960s. For all I know, the Peace Corps may have placed volunteers in suburban classrooms all along, but my particular experience was a unique one.

When I was in second grade, my dad became assistant dean of Syracuse University's University College. That same year, U.C. landed a contract to help train Peace Corps nurses and teaching volunteers for deployment in certain countries, including Somalia.  (The Peace Corps had just started in 1961 under President Kennedy.) Dad told me last night that at the last minute, the program people from the Peace Corps country desk sent along more people for training than had been contracted, promising to square this with the contracts people.  They didn't, and the contracts people held U.C. to the amount of money in the contract, so that in at least one case the University lost money on the deal. Dad learned from this experience that "if it isn't in the contract, you're not going to get paid for it." With my current accounting / auditing orientation, I can see the conflict inherent in the program people versus the contract people.  The program people want to accomplish as much as possible. The contract people are responsible for accounting for every dollar, so they can't just let things slide.  I don't know what U.C. could have done, except refuse the extra people until the contract was modified.  According to Dad, there was no time for such maneuvers. They did the trusting, idealistic thing, and got burned a little bit.

Well, anyway.

As part of this Peace Corps training program, some of the volunteer teachers did some student teaching in Mrs. Nevin's second grade class. They were the first male teachers I'd ever seen, kind of young and kind of cute in their suits and ties. One day, they announced that on Wednesday (it may have been some other day of the week, but let's call it a Wednesday), they would be bringing a special guest into the classroom, another Peace Corps volunteer who was actually from Somalia.  I can't begin to spell the man's first name right, but it the name was something like Sheeda or Sheerda Jama. One question the American volunteers suggested we put to our guest was about his name.  They expained that Jama would be his father's name. A longer version of Sheeda's name would add his grandfather's name, making him Sheeda Jama Achmed, and even a great grandfather's name, possibily making him Sheeda Jama Achmed Sheeda.

Wednesday came, and I had the flu.  Normally, I would have been glad for the day off from school, but I was dying to meet Sheeda Jama.  I'd never met anyone from another country before, except possibly Canada, let alone someone from the distant country the Peace Corps guys kept talking about.  My mom wouldn't let me go to school, as sick as I was. I was quite upset about it.

Mom must have called Dad at work that day, because that night, my dad brought home a guest for dinner: Sheeda Jama.  In my excitement (and my shyness) I forgot to ask the name question, but it was a wonderful experience for me, and a wonderful thing for my dad to do.  I think Mr. Jama enjoyed the meal, too, not because of me so much as because of my parents' hospitality.

Nobody at school believed me when I told them about it, but that's all right. It was pretty unbelievable.

My dad still remembers the night he made me green eggs and ham, but he doesn't remember bringing home a guest from the Peace Corps.  But I do, even if I don't remember a word the man actually said that evening forty years ago.  (I wish I did, but I don't.)

Thanks, Dad.

Karen

P.S. I'd be remiss if I failed to mention that my stepsister, Dr. Amy Sisley, was a Peace Corps volunteer in Tonga in the late 1970s.  She's now a trauma surgeon in Baltimore.