Teaching the arts to Dominican children: an intern's account

Smoke intern Annemarie Guzy '05 (at left) spent three months this summer volunteering for the Dominican Dream Project, a nonprofit organization that works to improve the education of poor children in the Dominican Republic by donating supplies, building new facilities and placing volunteers in classrooms. Guzy, a music and English concentrator, taught at the LaColonia School and a summer camp. She shares her experience in this first-person account.

The La Colonia School is in a neighborhood called the Callejon de la Loma, located outside Cabarete, a town famous to tourists who have money for windsurfing and kitesurfing. The neighborhood, although only about a five-minute walk from the surfing schools and fancy bars and restaurants along the beach, is far removed from the bustling tourist strip. The roads aren't paved, and dust flies through the air almost constantly from the traffic of the motoconchos - motorcycles that provide the main transportation and zoom in and out taking passengers anywhere nearby for 10 pesos, or about 25 cents. Besides the roaring of the motoconchos, one can hear bachata - a Dominican version of merengue - playing loudly in the Callejon at just about any time of day or night. Most here, unlike those in Cabarete, don't own electricity generators and thus can count on maybe three hours of electricity per day. Poverty is certainly present, although with such an easy-going, upbeat and positive energy, it doesn't seem to prevent the residents from enjoying what they do have.

I arrived at the beginning of June, early enough to witness a few days of school life before final exams and summer vacation. The classrooms were minimal, with only a chalkboard, desks and chairs. There were no textbooks, no colored maps on the walls. ... After bringing a few kids into their recently constructed library (consisting of about 100 books given to them by the Dream Project), I realized that most of them, even those as old as fourth grade, couldn't really read or write ... they hadn't even learned how to recognize and name the letters, let alone be able to read words. ... A large majority of the students fail the exams and are forced to repeat the grade.

Once exams were over, I offered a daily music/arts class to any child over the age of 5 who wanted to come. I had on average 15 to 20 students per day. At first, discipline was my biggest challenge. These kids were full of energy, and even with the often-overwhelming heat and humidity, they were always moving, always talking, always ready to do something else besides my music activities. They were also prone to fighting with each other and quarrelling about supplies and whose turn it was to answer a question. But after about a week getting used to one another, the class settled down to listen and learn, and suddenly class time became about music and art, rather than sitting down and being quiet. So we sang, played rhythm and listening games, made musical instruments and drew pictures about music.

One day before class I was setting up for an art project while the kids were anxiously waiting outside the gate. They called to me, "Anamaria, Anamaria, estamos listos!" ("Annemarie, Annemarie, we're ready!") After I told them several times that I needed a few more minutes to prepare, they began another course of action to get my attention: They began to sing a scale in solfege, just as we had learned the day before. And if one child sang the wrong note, another would stop the group, and they'd begin again. It was an incredible feeling. Not only could I see that they had really grasped what I had taught them the day before, they were excited about their new understanding of music and what I could offer them. ... Within a month's time, my kids and I had come to a pretty solid understanding of one another. They rarely missed a class; they were proud to collect their drawings and paintings at the end of class, and they were excited to know what was coming up the next day.