School of Bolivia

Hello from La Paz, the world's highest capital. The School of Bloggers have been in Cochabamba, Bolivia for a couple of weeks (following two weeks in and around Guadalajara, Mexico, where Chris's sister got married), and are now in La Paz for a little bit of business and mostly pleasure.

Now on to the interesting stuff: Bolivia has been in a familiar state of discontent recently in the weeks leading up to a referendum on the country's first indigenous president, Evo Morales. In the past week or so there have been a lot of road blocks, protests, and strikes over the pension system.

In the Cochabamba department, the urban and rural teachers' unions have been on strike for about a week now. All of the strike days will be made up at the end of the school year, like snow days, but that hasn't prevented government officials from making nasty statements that sound all too familiar. A representative from the Department of Education said something the other day like, "We ask that the teachers have a little more respect for their students."

Hmm. Just like in the U.S., if teachers think about their own livelihoods, they are being selfish.

Anyway, we are having a great time, and I will post another update when I can.

Love it or fix it

I don't often click on web ads, but today I did and came across GOOD Magazine. I was particularly excited about their slogan "Love it or fix it."

I have a lot of students who have a "Love it or leave it" attitude when it comes to being critical of the U.S. I'm excited about having a catchy new blurb to use as a teaching tool this fall.