More Swine Flu News

News reports locally here say that there are five more cases of Swine Flu, all spreading from our one student. The Ministry of Health has closed four more schools until May 28. I wonder if we will be out longer than we thought?

Swine Flu News Story - Closed School

Here is a translation of a news article in the Guayaquil newspaper "Expreso" announcing the closing of our school, Colegio Americano, due to the Swine Flu Outbreak.

"Cellular text messages calls were used by students of Colegio American to alert their parents of the presence of an outbreak of the virus AH1N1 in the institution. Near 10:00, and while an assembly was ongoing to choose the student leaders, the presence of the authorities of Education and Health of the Coast it interrupted the activities. The representatives of the Government informed the school administrators of the infection, tens of family parents arrived at the facilities to retieve their children. At 11:00 it was unusual to see as much activity at the entrances of the school. The constant traffic of vehicles drew attention of the passers-by, who prior to this had been ignorant of the situation. After the official news was announce, the students were held at the stadium of the institution. There, a brigade of the Ministry of Health explained the situation and gave instructions on what to do in case of presenting/displaying symptoms. The authorities of the school gave an official notice in closing of the establishment for 8 days. Also one of the representatives asked students, “like an act of citizen responsibility”, to stay in house and to avoid contact with third parties or to be in public places for 8 days, time that is for delay in the virus in presenting/displaying symptoms. In case of suspecting the contagion, it was requested for students to contact the Ministry from Health or authorities of the Colegio Americano."

Details on Swine Flu - School Closing

Now that the chaos has settled down, and I’ve had a good night’s sleep, here is a more detailed recollection of the Swine Flu outbreak at my school:

The day started knowing it would be chaos anyway. It was student council elections, which is pretty much an all day affair here at Colegio Americano. The schedule was supposed to be:

Period 1 – Normal Class
Period 2-3 – Assembly at the stadium to “present the candidates”
1st Recess – Normal
Period 4-5 – Normal Class
Lunch Recess – Prepare for chaos
Period 6-7 – Student elections.

Of course, here, student elections are more like a big run up to a massive soccer game here, with even more pageantry, but I digress.

The first thing that happened was there was no power to the secondary school, then there was, then there wasn’t. Since my room has few windows and is poorly ventilated without the electrically powered A/C-Fan unit, we switched from inside to me giving a lecture outside for my marketing class. First period finally over, it was off to the stadium.

Elections in Ecuador are quite different than what we do in the states. In the states, we vote for individual candidate who just happens to be a member of a political party. In Ecuador, you vote for a political party. You vote, and the members of the political party you vote for get office. So for our elections there were two competing slates – “Lista A” with their blue and white colors matching those of the Guayas state flag, and Lista B matching the yellow, red and blue of the Ecuador State flag (kind of like one being in the colors of the American flag while the other is in the colors of the flag of Texas, as an example).

First we start with some boring speeches by school officials about what we were going to do, and listening to stern advisements to all to behave in a “dignified and disciplined manner.” Then the student speeches started and the party began. With the student introductions there were horns blowing and confetti flying, with students singing and dancing to pounding drums in celebration after every speech and announcements of one of “their” candidates.

Great times, and I fully expect to regain my hearing in 2-3 weeks.

Finally, the candidates were sat down in chairs while school administrators asked each candidate a series of questions – two in Spanish and Two in English – with more singing, chanting and pounding drums made at every answer.

Then two final speeches from administrators about how the elections would proceed – and then there was a delay.
In fact, there was a delay that stretched on for quite a while.

With the whole stadium becoming restless, the principal finally came out to announce that members of the state’s health department were on the campus. One student who had just returned from a trip to Miami had just been diagnosed with Swine Flu, which officially was known as virus N1H1, and because of this classes would be suspended for eight days. And all hell broke loose.

The kids were cheering as if Ecuador had just scored the winning goal to win the World Cup Championship. This attitude changed fairly quickly, though, as Health Department officials removed the infected student’s course from the stadium to undergo examinations at the infirmary. Even more so as the minutes dragged on, and information was meted out piecemeal. This was not a vacation. Students would need to stay at home and not go to crowded public areas: no sporting events or extracurricular activities, no malls, restaurants, parties or movie theaters. Realizing what they had been hearing about the Swine Flu outbreak in the news, many students dived into their backpacks to pull out the breathing masks they used in chemistry. Others wrapped cloths over their faces. Some cried in fear. Many times I was asked, “Mr. Evans, are you worried?” and I would patiently explained why I wasn’t that worried, but that the restrictions were extremely necessary to follow to prevent a wider contamination.

Finally we were told that buses were arriving to take the children home, but that no one would be able to leave unless they first had been given an official notification that was being jointly made by the Health Department, Department of Education and the school. All of the students were dismissed to their 5th hour classes to await the notifications.

By this time a number of the students had checked their Blackberries to see that the school closing had already made the news on the local paper El Universo.

Finally the official notifications came. The students were sent off. There was a final meeting of teachers and staff, mostly saying that the same restrictions applying for the students applied to us as well. Classes would restart on May 25.

And home I went.

Swine Flu is Here!

Well, for those not knowing the breaking news, Swine Flu (excuse me, Infuenza virus H1N1) has hit Guayaquil, Ecuador - AT MY SCHOOL!

Yes, a young 13-year-old child who just returned from a trip to Miami on Sunday, and attended school on Monday for only 2-3 hours before going home sick, has been announced as Ecuador's first confirmed case. Our school was one of the first to know, due to the phalanx of department of health workers who descended on our school with no warning about 9:30 this morning. After a great deal of confusion, the student's classmates in Segundo Curso (equivalent of 8th Grade in the US system) were trotted off to the infirmary for a checkup - and a second student was quarantined for "suspicious symptoms" - school is canceled for eight days - until May 25th at least.

As for me, I am sternly cautioned to remain at home, avoid public areas and especially around crowded areas, maintain a high personal hygiene and take lots of Vitamin C. If a start to show any symptoms, I must immediately contact the department of health.

As my good buddy Justin is probably saying - Oh, Joy.

I think I'm feeling a bit feverish.

Busy and tired

Today was hectic but fun. After a rollicking day teaching my normal set of classes at Colegio Americano, I had a short break before teaching my Technical English class with my group of pilots. It was also the first night of teaching American History at Blue Hill College. One surprise is that I have a couple of friendly faces in my college night class. Two students who were seniors last year, including one who was an IB Diploma recipient in my business class, are taking my history class. Good times.

One bit of news that made me really happy: I received an email from Ashford University - the college with the Distance Learning Program I am using to obtain my teaching certificate - to tell me it is time to start doing the final paperwork towards graduation. Yahoo-ee! It has been a long hall, but the light is getting ever bigger at the end of the tunnel.

Wow! Is it really May?

Life is so crazy I didn't even realize it has been two weeks since my last blog. Lots of news to behold. I'll absolutely find it impossible to share it all but here it goes.

The first thing is that most things at school are going well. Classes are well established and the kids, for the most part, are into the swing of things. However, like most places there is a small percentage of students who are more interested in the quality of their nail polish or what other other students are doing with their lives than actually going to school for what a teenager is supposed to do (study, that was not a trick question). Anyway, It is three partial weeks and one full week in, almost halfway through the first quarter and I have my small cadre of students who are currently running a 19% or 32% grade so far. Tuesday notices go to parents so I probably will have a flurry of parent-teacher conferences right after.

The place where school is NOT going well is the schedule. We went three wees and everything was fine. Then the Powers That Be (PTB) announced a schedule change for the entire secondary school. Many teachers learned they were teaching completely different classes. Not I, since my classes are so specialized but it did scramble who I saw when. We got a full half day warning before the schedule flipped.

But when there is a flip there will be a flop, so when we walked into school the following Wednesday one of the admin assistants was waiting at the bus stop to hand out NEW SCHEDULES THAT WERE TO START THAT DAY! There were so many bad parts to this it could take me hours to vent. First, I had expected two prep periods that day, so I had been planning to use my lunch period to give some makeup tests to some students. I also had planned to spend some time during one prep period finishing some handouts to use during a couple of my afternoon classes.

With the new schedule, I had no prep periods, none. So with me having to pull duty during first recess, and the make-up tests during lunch, I did not have a single break for any reason all day. This meant I had no break to prepare my materials for my afternoon class. Worse, I now had classes for which were not previously scheduled for that day, so students showed up with no books, since many had left the books at home, thinking there would be no class.

In the few times I had a moment to speak to one of administration, I was not diplomatic in saying how horrid I thought this had been handled. Even worse in my book, we never received an explanation as to why the major schedule change was needed, nor received any reason why they couldn't wait even 24 hours to let teachers have a chance to adjust.

Grrr!

On a quasi-plus side, I've agreed with Blue Hill College here in Guayaquil to teach some history classes. I'll be teaching an American History, 1945-Present Class starting on May 5. Of course, I still am teaching a full spread of classes in the day, PLUS tutoring a group of pilots for their English Certification Test. PLUS I am still finishing off the first stage of a teaching certification program through a distance learning program.

No stress here.