Malawi students share their challenges with Lakeland students

On Nov. 27, students from Malawi helped bring awareness to fellow Lakeland students of their struggles coming to America in the convocation.

Sophomore Rae Zeman, the emcee for the convocation, introduced Jeff Elzinga, general studies division chair, who started the Students of Malawi organization with David Gallianetti, director of communications and sports information, last January. The mission of the organization is to help gain awareness of the Malawi students of frica.

Elzinga was a diplomat in the 1990's, and he said, "Our connection with the country started in 1999."

Elzinga and President Stephen Gould talked about the idea of bringing students from Malawi to Lakeland College, and they decided that they would bring five students to the campus every year.

The Malawi students study for three years in order to earn a bachelor's degree and become "teachers of teachers," Elzinga said. This means that the graduated students will travel back to Malawi to help educate the current teachers in the Malawi schools.

Elzinga continued, "We graduated now 30 students."

A slide show was then shown of the landscape of Malawi, which is a country in southeastern Africa.

According to Elzinga, the country is about the size of the state of Pennsylvania, and Lake Malawi is about the size of Lake Michigan.

Elzinga then gave a background of the situation in Malawi. Learning "occurs outside under trees." One of the most important things Malawians need are school buildings. "Facilities at best are second rate," said Elzinga of the schools in Malawi.

School supplies were brought over for the students in Malawi, along with soccer balls, which is a "prized possession" in Malawi. "To get a soccer ball is kind of a treat," Elzinga said.

Elzinga said that on one of the last trips they took to Malawi, they brought a lot of school supplies.

In two high schools, unused school supplies were collected at the end of the school year. "Both schools collected fifty boxes of school supplies," Elzinga said. They then brought these supplies to the Malawians.

A community service project was boxing books to bring to Malawi. Also, six two-room schools have been built in Malawi.

An audio slide show was then played, in which Malawi students talked about their lives. The point was made in the audio show that Malawi does not have enough
supplies, and that "Teaching is one of the lowest-paying jobs in Malawi," and also that in Malawi, teachers were looked at as "failures."

Then Elisa Waltz, Matt Holm, and Rae Zeman interviewed five Malawi students about their challenges in coming to America, favorite experiences at Lakeland thus far, and what they miss from home.

After the interview was over, audience members were able to ask the Malawi students any further questions.

The convocation was very informative of an extremely important issue. Those who attended were given a better understanding of what the situation is like in Malawi. They became aware of just how many obstacles and challenges the Malawi students have overcome in order to follow their dream of studying at Lakeland to help fellow Malawians by becoming "teachers of teachers."