Preparing for an Exchange

As Constitution High School students eagerly await the visit of their Afghan counterparts—delayed several times now due to visa complications—they’ve begun preparing by learning Dari phrases. Many have commented on how similar "Salaam," a way of saying hello borrowed from Arabic, sounds to "shalom." Meanwhile, others, invoking a kind logic unique to High School Students, maintain that "Dari would be easier if it were Spanish."

While everyone is anxious to finally meet the people they have been collaborating with virtually since July, the delays have given everyone the opportunity to prepare and come up with more projects to do with their Afghan "brothers and sisters," as they’ve taken to calling eachother on the Shutterfly site. It’s also given us more opportunities for photo comparisons. As Philadelphia slogged through it’s fourth major snowstorm of the Winter today, an avalanche in Afghanistan earlier this month took hundreds of lives and trapped thousands more, and effectively cut Kabul off from the entire North of the country except by air travel. Though the official photography portion of the project has been closed, the students have decided these were important incidents to capture.

NCC Partner on Cover of New York Times

On Monday, the New York Times ran the this piece on the front page. The article exlpains the resurgence of the Hazara minority in Afghanistan through education and self-empowerment, drawing comparisons to the Kurds in Iraq. Marefat High School, the NCC's partner on the outskirts of Kabul, features prominantly in the piece, which includes a slideshow of photographs taken at the school. The article and its prominant placement in one of the world's most highly-egarded newspapers, is testamony to one of Being We, the People's primary purposes--exploring the role of minorities in different democracies.

Another NCC'er Reports on the War in Afghanistan

As a variation on the theme of last week's post, we have another article by an NCC'er--this time, Jeffrey Stern, the Center's International Engagement Manager. Stern Rights about Obama's plan for Afghanistan from a different perspective, that of its implications for the dispute between Pakistan and India. Check out Stern's article for Foreign Policy here

NCC Partner Reports on Afghanistan Surge for CNN

Nasim Fekrat was among the first partners the NCC worked with to launch our International Engagement Project. A young journalist, photographer, and blogger from Afghanistan, Nasim embodied the values the Center exists to promote. Nasim was a fellow at the Center's 2009 Peter Jennings Project, and is currently a full-time undergraduate student at Dickinson college. This week, he posted his take on President Obama's decision to increase the United States' presence in Afghanistan by 30,000 troops, which you can read here.

Talking About War

Our last post centered on comments as a means of exchange, leading up to the visit the Afghan students make to America. This week has seen a specific exchange of commentary that illuminates how casual, topical interface between students on any given subject can make way for exchanging more profound insights that prompt discussion on political, historical, moral, and philosophical issues.

Earlier in the month, an American student who maintains an active interest in military history asked the Afghan students at via the shutterfly site what their opinion was of the Taliban and the war on terrorism. The “Taliban is not just a threat for Afghanistan,” A Marefat student named Bismullah responded, “but for every nation in the world, that is why they have to be defeated, and I think this is the interest of all those who participate in the war.” He went on to argue that “war itself for tackling a group like Taliban is not wrong, but ways we selected strategies can be right or wrong and effective or not effective.” In other words, the ends justify the means—as long as the means are effective.

Bismullah’s opinion is informed by the community he belongs to. Marefat High School is made up predominantly of Hazaras, an ethnic and religious minority in Afghanistan who have suffered disproportionately under the Taliban, and would again be among the worst treated should the Taliban prevail in Afghanistan again. This is an engaging way to interpret the social, political, and cultural influences on the opinions of students in another country. That analysis can help students see how their own views are formed.

For the time being, Bismullah has posted his matter-of-fact answers to two of the most pressing contemporary political questions—one of which has been relevent for as long as mankind has been around, the other has only become an issue within the last several years. Can you justify war? And: does the Taliban constitute a threat to the international community, or is it purely a nationalistic movement, as it claims to be?

We’ll wait to see whether anyone disagrees with Bismullah’s opinions. Bismullah, for his part, hopes that someone does. “You are asking interesting questions, “he says. “Please keep asking such questions so that we can exchange ideas and views.”

The Importance of Exchange

One of the most immediately rewarding and informative aspects of Being
We, the People is the students' exchange of commentary. Though all
students have been strongly encouraged to post comments on the
Shutterfly site, they've never been obliged to by any mechanism; it's
not a requirement for completing the project, they're not graded on
comments, and there is no extra credit they might earn. Instead, when
American students have questions about Afghanistan, we've reminded them
that there is a rich resource at their disposal--their counterparts in Afghanistan-who are eager and able to answer questions. In addition to cultivating the skill and inclination to actively seek out answers, this method has helped the students develop an understanding of "human capital," the resource their partners can be to them, and they can be to their partners.

The progression in the commentary's subject and tone is informative in
its own right. As the students have become more comfortable with the
project, their comments to one another have become more substantive. At
the outset, students' comments were rarely deeper than their approval of
a given image. The teachers in both Philadelphia and Kabul encouraged
the students to begin employing the photography skills and nomenclature
they were learning to evaluate each others' images, and soon students
were posting evaluations that touched on concepts like "the rule of
thirds" "sense of moment" and "framing." As the students became
comfortable being critical of one another's work, they extended their
comments to include questions of context-about what the photographer had
wanted to say with the image, rather than merely what it looked like.

Now, it's no longer just photographs inspiring comments, but comments
inspiring photographs as well. Students are asking eachother
questions--how are people with mental disabilities cared for in your
country; how does the Taliban and the war on terrorism effect your
life?--and in so doing, inspiring eachother to go out and find or enhance
their answers. The conversations have sparked ideas of new themes, and
the students have agreed to try to take photographs of, for example,
mental health care in their respective countries, after becoming
interested in how it compares. The students are beginning to understand
the respective benefits and drawbacks of "showing" versus "telling." And
more importantly, they're learning the history and culture of another
country, as told through the eyes (and words) of that country's youth.

Being We, the People in Your Classroom

Plans are underway to create a curriculum that would better enable your students to replicate the remarkable work achieved by students at Constitution High School in Philadelphia and at Marefat High School in Kabul, Afghanistan.

The Center is working closely with educators from both schools, as well as professional curriculum developers to allow your students to add their experience to the diverse narrative of what it means to be a citizen of the world. Through a variety of activities and writing prompts, students will be encouraged to think about their own experience in regard to the six themes addressed in the project; myself, religion, work, participation, expression and commerce. After considering the themes, students will be sent out into their communities to document their experience through photography. Ultimately, students will then consider the ways their experience compares and contrasts to students from around the country and world.

This is sure to be an excellent service-learning project for students interested in compartive democratization and documenting their experience as part of "We, the People."

Until the curriculum is finished, be sure to keep up with the project on http://www.beingwethepeople.shutterfly.com/ and the Center's website, www.constitutioncenter.org/international