My First Real Job!!

I am officially a working man. And working in a field that has nothing to do with what I had studied in college. To remind you, the whole idea of the Benedictine Volunteer Corps is that graduates of Saint John’s travel to other Benedictine monasteries around the world to assist and volunteer where the local monks can use help. Here in Bogotá, the monks run two schools: Colegio San Carlos and Colegio San Benito. We volunteer as full time English teachers at Colegio San Benito, currently celebrating its 40^th year of teaching.

               As English teachers, we assist the Colombian teachers in their grammar focused classes and individually teach separate classes that focus on vocabulary, speaking, and listening. In English class, the school curriculum requires the entire lesson to be in English, especially when native speakers are teaching it. This often frustrates the students because the listening and the speaking are almost always the hardest parts of learning a language. Fortunately, I don’t know Spanish well enough for them to get mad at me for not speaking in Spanish. For not acquiescing to their pleas of mercy, to their pleas of a reprieve from English.

So, what is it like to work in a foreign country? To teach in a foreign school?

               First impressions are made from the way things look, right? (judging books by their covers and what-not) So, starting there, the school is gorgeous. The quaint, little school would stand out as the gem of this neighborhood if the high walls surrounding the facility did not exist. Red-brick buildings, accented by deep-blue doorways and window frames cover the grounds with breezy, covered walkways leading to each classroom. Students do not change classes for different subjects like I had in middle and high school, but rather the teachers move from class to class. During classes, the walkways are empty, but at the sound of the bell, students flood the courtyards and disperse to every corner of the campus. The brief time between classes lasts only as long as a song. Literally. They play a different song at the changing period, ranging from a Gregorian chant to the piano version of Bohemian rhapsody.

               Twice during the day, school takes a hiatus for an hour. The first, called onces, is meant for coffee and pastries. The teachers have a break room with a ginormous, steel coffee pot that has black coffee, tinto, in the bottom and milk + coffee in the top. A bin of fresh pastries awaits the oncoming stampede of teachers (limit of 2 per teacher.) Every day, we go down to get a fresh cup of coffee (in our labeled coffee mugs) and get to know the teachers better. This is a phenomenal practice that should be introduced to every business in the US. The other break is for lunch. There is no lunch room here, so the students will all bring small, boxed lunches. They eat their main lunch at home after school lets out, so these breaks for them are more snack and play breaks.

               If you were to walk the school grounds during this long break, you’d see some students playing volleyball or basketball, student couples lounging in the courtyards, and groups of friends walking laps through the walkways deep in conversion. The most popular activity for the students is ping pong. Students will borrow paddles and balls from an equipment checkout room and crowd the tables in daily tournaments or try to best the top players.

               The teachers here are all phenomenal. We have spent much of our time with the English department, but there are a few others who know a bit of English – and have an incredible amount of patience for crude Spanish – that we are getting to know as well. It is a very young group of teachers who all have a plentitude of energy when they are at school. The one downside about our relationships with the other teachers is that we are not supposed to hang out with them outside of school sanctioned events and the class day, which means don’t go get drinks, hang out, or travel together. This is because there has been a load of drama with some of the past volunteers. Between dating teachers and volunteers making cliques amongst the staff, those in charge want less of this. Since we are each only here for a year while the teachers are here for much longer, there is reason in limiting the amount of destruction we could potentially cause, I suppose.

But what about the most important part, the kids?

               The kids here are phenomenal. As mentioned earlier, the monastery started and still looks after the two schools. The other school, San Carlos, is known all across Colombia as one (if not the most) prestigious schools in Colombia and South America. Presidents, artists, and other national figures have all come from this Benedictine, all-boys school. When we were travelling in Santander and mentioned that we lived at Colegio San Carlos, everyone knew where we meant.

               But, we work at San Benito. This school is meant to serve families that aren’t the richest and most prosperous of the country but have talented and intelligent children. Most of the teachers, administrators, and monks would argue that our students could compete with those of San Carlos any day. It’s a damn good group of students.

               In passing, the students are always excited to say good morning and test out an English phrase or two, greeting you with a high-five and fist bump (the standard greeting of CSB). They love to play ping pong, check out the size of your shoe, and interrogate you about your love interests.

               In classes, it’s a bit different. Class always starts with the students standing by their desks. They sit after the teacher has greeted them for the day, and immediately begin dozens of side conversations amongst themselves. One major difference between students I went to school with and the students in Colombia is the amount of talking they do. It takes a special teacher or a lot of asking for silence to get to teaching the actual lessons. But thankfully, I’m slowly figuring out how to do that.

They know a hell of a lot about what they are doing when they actually begin. This makes teaching in 100% English easier in most cases, although there is quite a variety of ability in knowledge levels. Some students can have full-on conversations with us, while others need to hear a much slower version of English with lots of repetition.

               One last interesting point. The students LOVE to make their work neat. It’s something I never noticed in my schooling, but here the lines are always straight as an arrow and torn paper appears as if cut by a scissors. Everyone has whiteout to cover up mistakes, and often I see people restart the whole assignment because of one mess-up in their work. It’s like the scene in Dead Poet’s Society when Cameron uses a ruler to rip out pages from his book. I feel like this will get frustrating in situations where things don’t need to look elegant at all, like a quick quiz for review (decorated border and perfect edges are the least of my concerns.)

Overall, they are well behaved students and very outgoing. This year will have too many amazing stories to tell, I can already see that. The word Colombians use for a person that is well-behaved, friendly, nice, and uses their manners like these students is juicioso. It’s phenomenal to have estudiantes juiciosos.