Cori Jo Duncan, a W.F West High School graduate and Lewis County resident, was able to step out of her routine in Chehalis as a fourth grade teacher at Orin Smith Elementary and do an educational exchange in Namibia, Africa, this summer.
Duncan graduated from W.F West in 2006 and then attended Pacific Lutheran University (PLU), where she graduated in 2010.
According to Duncan, PLU has a strong study abroad program and, when she was there, she could have done some student teaching in Namibia.
“I didn’t do that and I kind of always wished that I had,” Duncan said.
She was double majoring at the time, so she couldn't be away from the university. After her graduation from PLU, she served in the Peace Corps for two years. She worked in the Federated States of Micronesia on the island of Pohnpei.
“My Peace Corps experience was amazing, and I worked with a public library and had a really great partner, and they’re still using some of my lessons 10 years later,” Duncan said.
The experience gave her some international teaching experience, which was a requirement when applying to return to Namibia for this past summer’s teaching exchange.
After some apprehension and delays with her application because of her husband’s occupation as a firefighter and the fact she had a 1-year-old child, Duncan finally applied to the program at the urging of her husband.
After applying, she was accepted two weeks later. The program accepted her time in the Peace Corps as her international teaching experience.
Rachel Dorsey, Orin Smith Elementary School’s principal, told The Chronicle that the application process was extremely competitive and only seven applicants were selected.
“We’re really excited about the opportunity to do an exchange program like this, and I was really impressed that she just jumped in and went for it, and I signed on the dotted line and away we went,” Dorsey said.
The educational teaching exchange project is called Uukumwe and aims to bring back PLU alumni who student taught in Namibia now that they’re experienced teachers. Namibian teachers then get to come to the United States as well.
Duncan was in Namibia from the end of July to the beginning of August. Namibia has year-round school with the academic year ending in December, so Duncan didn’t have to sacrifice time away from her students while participating. The schools in Namibia are currently on a semester break, so the Namibian teachers are also not sacrificing time away from their students.
According to Duncan, Namibia is not somewhere you get to by accident. The journey requires 23 hours in the air with three flights and multiple layovers. All together, it took Duncan 60 hours to travel to Namibia.
Among the major differences between schooling in Namibia versus the U.S., both Duncan and Antoniella Karieue, who is the Namibian teacher currently at Orin Smith, highlighted the daily schedules.
The school day in Namibia runs from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. because administrators want children out of school before the heat of the day sets in. Duncan and the other teachers from PLU visited during the winter, so school ran from 7:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. so the children wouldn’t have to walk to school in the dark. The school day in Namibia goes almost straight through with a 20-minute tea break around 10:30 a.m.
Duncan and the other teachers from PLU observed and collaborated with the teachers in Namibia who would return with them to the U.S. The pair discussed things they’d both like to work on in the classrooms and co-taught both in Namibia and now in Chehalis.
“Our styles went together so seamlessly and we were able to co-teach her students. That was a great experience,” Duncan said.
Like Duncan, Karieue has been teaching for 14 years. While Duncan teaches math, Karieue teaches reading in both a native Namibian language and English.
While in Namibia, Duncan wasn’t always teaching. She and the other teachers from the states were able to visit a craft market and Etosha National Park, ride in an open air safari, play with orphaned baboons and go out for a fancy dinner with the whole team, including the Namibian teachers.
“They chose a nice fancy restaurant and they were so excited. It was overlooking the city of Windhoek, where we were, and we watched the sunset and had our dinner. It was really fun,” Duncan said.
Her favorite moment from the trip, however, was when the group went to a watering hole and saw over 100 elephants over the course of three hours.
“I was so happy every day, even when things didn’t go right,” Duncan said. “I was with six other PLU alumni and my professor who was one of my favorite professors while I was there. So we just had this power house group of educators, and being involved in a community like that and their excitement for what’s going on in education was really invigorating for me. You can get really lost in the weeds when you're here at the school. That experience gave me a boost and I was really excited to come back.”
After school in Chehalis had been underway, Karieue joined Duncan’s fourth grade class at Orin Smith Elementary School.
“I wanted to come because we are sitting with this problem in Namibia, reading is a very very major problem. In my country, learners are struggling to read,” Karieue told The Chronicle.
She continued: “I was like, ‘is it the learners or the teachers? Is it the methodology that I’m using? Or do I need to adapt a new skill to help these learners read?’”
“I believe every child can read,” she added. “It's just that they don’t learn at the same pace. I know that if I know how to do it every child will be able to read.”
Since being at Orin Smith, Karieue has found many things that she would like to adapt to her own classroom, including having monthly character traits be displayed.
“I love that. I can’t wait to go and introduce that at my school,” she said.
Karieue also highlighted how much she enjoyed being able to sit in a meeting about teaching students how to set and meet goals. She also loved the fact that students participate in free choice reading when they’re done with other assignments.
She expressed that she was very sad her two weeks were almost up at Orin Smith Elementary.
“If I get another opportunity, I will not hesitate to come back,” Karieue said.
