Asante Sana

Last school year, Sue Stein, who works with Waynflete’s EAL students, spent the semester traveling in Africa.  In her trip blog, she described the purpose of her trip this way.

For years I have listened to students tell stories of their lives in Africa. I have worked with parents who have no frame of reference for school in the US, and I have read essay after essay on what it is like to be living in different worlds. I decided to take a six month leave of absence from my job and go to Africa myself to experience life there first hand. I want to feel what my students feel and know in my bones what it is like to be a foreigner in a culture where I am the minority. I want to be surrounded by languages that I don’t understand. I want to see the schools where my students and their parents attended. I want to be an observer, so that I can come back and do my job with more of a in-my-bones understanding of their experience.

This past weekend she traveled to New York City to meet with Dr. Josephine Ojiambo of United Nations Population Fund.  Sue presented Dr. Ojiambo with six Apple computers and six Eee laptops to take to Bungoma, Kenya, to help supply that county’s first community library. Sue was in Bungoma last April working with French teacher Lindsay Kaplan’s sister Eva who works with Maria’s Libraries. Waynflete generously donated the computers and Page Lennig and Elyse Bayizere (’14) helped get them ready to be shipped.

On behalf of the Bungoma Library Committee, Dr.Ojiambo says, “Asante Sana” (Thank You Very Much).