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Principal travels to Afghanistan as part of education collaborative

Date: 5/23/2013

By Chris Maza

chrism@thereminder.com

LONGMEADOW — For many educators the weeklong April break is a welcome opportunity to take a deep breath and some time to recharge before the stretch run prior to the end of the school year.

But for Wolf Swamp School Principal Neil Gile, it was the time for an amazing opportunity to experience the educational system in a part of the world that is in many ways still finding itself.

Gile, through a collaborative effort with Richard Roque and the American International College Doctoral program, spent the week in Afghanistan and had the opportunity to meet with administrators of higher education at Bakhtar University.

"I was very opportunistic with this trip. My doctoral thesis is on rural educational leadership and picking apart what makes good leadership," he said. "While I was there I had the opportunity of presenting and lecturing. My topic was sustaining competitive schools in a global market"

Gile was also able to first-hand experience with the educational system in Kabul and Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

"It was fascinating dealing with a country that is in the seedling phases of public education," he said. "The system had been crippled for decades because of the Taliban."

Gile explained that most of the education in the country was done in schools owned by "private enterprises with specific interests."

"Bakhtar University has a school that is reasonably affordable and open to most, but the International School of Kabul down the road, for example, was close to $12,000 a year to attend," he said. "It's a model that says those who can afford it can go to school and everyone else will just have to make due."

The differences between the two institutions were apparent, Gile said, describing the Bakhtar school as "very institutionalized."

"There was nothing on the walls. The kids sat in rows with so little room that they had to keep their belongings with them, behind or under their desks, and they sat and listened to lecture," he said. "There was no opportunity to collaborate or get into small groups. It reminded me of the little one-room schoolhouses that existed [in the U.S.] 100 years ago."

The International School, however, had a much different feel to it.

"The International School felt very westernized," Gile said. "I walked into the classroom and I felt like I was walking into an American classroom. There were things on the wall and lots of opportunities for students to engage each other."

Exposure to different cultures, he said, also differed between the two schools. He explained that one day he wore a tie featuring characters from Dr. Seuss' "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish," which in the Bakhtar school got humorous reactions from the students, largely because they had not heard of the book. The reaction at the International School, however, was one of excitement.

"Coincidentally, they had just done a unit on Dr. Seuss and I got a standing ovation because they though I was Dr. Seuss," he said. "I had to disappoint them and explain that I wasn't, but I knew where he lived."

The American School of Dubai, he said, also had much more in the way of space and technology, even moving toward a one-to-one computer model that many schools in the U.S. do not have.

Overall, he said he was "opportunistic" of the prospects of the Afghan people continuing their advances in education, largely because of their thirst for it.

"These are people who want to be educated," he said. "They want the chance to succeed and climb out of what has been decades of war."

One of the positives that Gile took note of was the importance placed on language in the Afghan schools.

"Students learned three different languages," he said. "In addition to English, each student also learned Pashtun and Dari."

Gile also said that the experiences helped reinforce the notion that through they may be on opposite sides of the world, children are largely the same.

"At one point, we received letters written by students and some of the girls had decorated them beautifully with flowers and other art that they made themselves," he said. "For me, that was one of those 'aha moments' when I remembered that we are all human beings and a little girl is a little girl regardless of where she's from."

He was also struck by how welcoming and compassionate both students and administrators were throughout the trip.

"We were there right around the time when everything was happening in Boston," Gile said, referencing the bombing at the Boston Marathon on April 15. "By that time everyone knew about it and knew we were from Massachustts and we were greeted with many kind words and hugs everywhere we went.

"I went there expecting the people to be amazing and that was validated," he continued.

Gile said he relished in the opportunity to share ways to build upon the educational foundations that exist in the country. He spent a great deal of time talking with the chancellor of Bakhtar University and explained the importance of having enough physical space for the students, among other things.

"It was a concept that they really didn't have an understanding of," he said.

Gile also said he was excited to have the opportunity to bring things he learned back to the United States and hoped to help Longmeadow students gain a better understanding of the culture and people in the region through collaboration with the contacts he made on his trip.

"It's a priceless thing. I can't begin to quantify its significance," Gile said. "Global education plays such a major role in breaking down misconceptions. By exposing our students to relationships with people thousands of miles away, we can get them to understand the fundamental threads that connect us all."