Starting another year at AFE!
After a very nice and relaxing christmas in Washington State, Jana and I returned to Honduras last week to start our second year at AFE. The Honduras school calendar is February through November, which made the timing our first trip home perfect.
This week is teacher training and preparation and today we reviewed the 6 pillars of AFE’s mission:
- Family
- Spiritual
- Emotional
- Education
- Sexual
- Health
These 6 pillars describe how AFE is changing the trash dump community one family at a time. Instead of simply providing education to kids, AFE is providing help for the children, their family, and their entire lives.
It struck me today as we were reviewing these tenants today that the setting had more of a bible study feel than a teacher training normally would. Here we had nearly 20 teachers gathered around tables talking eagerly about how we can use these tenants to be more than teachers. Instead, we were each discussing and sharing how we can become friends and mentors with our students at the same time as we instruct them.
Growing up in a public school, I am sure that my teachers had conferences and training sessions. In these sessions I am sure they talked about skills to be a better teacher, how to relate to your students, and how to handle various crisis. However, today we were talking about how we could better share our own lives with our students, how to share the good news with our students, how to help them not just pass a class, but to be prepared for life.
Ever since Jana and I decided to come down here to teach, I knew we were called to the kids here in the Tegucigalpa trash dump. I knew that it was our job to come here and try to share our hearts and our lives with the people here. And today I realized that every single teacher at our school feels the same way. We are an amazing team, and I am looking forward to see what God will do among us.