The future of One World Youth Project!

Dear ­­­­One World Youth Project community,

OWYP staff and alums at the ECF Welcoming Reception

We write to share an exciting development.  As of November 3, 2012, One World Youth Project (OWYP) became a program of the El-Hibri Charitable Foundation (ECF), a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization in Washington, DC dedicated to promoting peace education and mutual understanding and respect across geographical and cultural boundaries.  This mutually beneficial relationship will support and develop our work as we move forward into the next decade of One World Youth Project!

At a moment in human history when positive change is needed and so few resources in civil society are available to meet these needs, we believe that strategic collaboration is the way forward for the non-profit sector. As you can imagine, this new collaboration took months of careful consideration and many conversations between our two organizations.

One World Youth Project and El-Hibri Charitable Foundation share the same values, goals and strong sense of integrity.    We complement each other.  We feel that, together, our combined staff teams will better inspire, explore and promote mutual understanding and respect through the connection of classrooms across cultures.

One World Youth Project as you know it has not changed: all current clients will receive the same services that we had planned for this academic year.

The OWYP stakeholders may have noticed a few changes: an ECF logo on the OWYP website accompanying the One World logo, along with ECF’s phone number and Washington, DC address.  Some of the OWYP staff members have transitioned  into an advisory board role as ECF staff members have stepped up to support the program with their core competencies in operations and logistics.  Beyond this, you may only notice a less stressed program staff benefitting from a greater support staff and additional resources to realize the vision we all share for a more empowered, discerning and empathetic generation of global citizens.

For the past four months you have not heard much from us on our blog, Facebook or Twitter. We have been focusing internally as we combine teams with ECF, move offices, and make sure our university and secondary school students receive all the support and attention needed to make our 2012-2013 program year a success.  The hard work of merging is complete and we will now be sharing more updates and stories as the summer begins!  Our university teams have been chosen for next program year and you will soon get to meet the 2013-2014 Project Manager Fellows and hear updates from our annual Online Training Course, which just launched this week.  Stay tuned!

As a part of our transition, after 8 years serving as One World Youth Project’s Executive Director, Founder Jess Rimington is stepping down  –passing the reigns to Cady Voge who now serves in OWYP’s new leadership position of Program Manager.  Cady Voge has worked with One World Youth Project since 2004.  For the past three years, she has worked closely with Jess and the rest of our start-up team to lead the development of the OWYP program.  There is no one better equipped to be leading our efforts forward at this exciting moment for One World Youth Project.

Founder Jess Rimington will remain actively involved as Chair of the Advisory Board.  She is continuing in the education movement and joining a new founding team in summer 2013.  Stay tuned to hear more about Jess’s next steps!  We are excited for her next journey and know that she will always remain active in the One World Youth Project family and movement.

We hope that our combined efforts with ECF under a unified, shared vision will serve as an example for civil society of how to pool resources effectively and work together, to better achieve our shared goals. Together we look forward to ushering in the next chapter of One World Youth Project’s impact in collaboration with you!

Sincerely,

The OWYP Team

Standardized testing creates standard students

Ernest Owens, originally from Chicago, Illinois, is a Communication & Public Service major at the University of Pennsylvania. He serves as a columnist for the Daily Pennsylvanian, broadcasts his hit radio show “Ernestly Speaking!” on WQHS.org, and is an elected student government representative at UPenn.

Written by Ernest Owens

“There was a time when kids used to go outside and actually pick up bugs,” my mother said to me when I was in high school. “We used to have museum field trips and have volcano projects…I guess you guys don’t have time for that anymore.”

And she was right. What caused such a dichotomy from the 1980s school classroom and that of today? What dismissed the bug picking and museum field trips? Standardized testing? Bingo.

Standardized testing, for all of its proposed grandeur, has failed to succeed in its primary purpose and it will fail in the educational enrichment of American public schools.

Firstly, the purpose for standardized testing is simple: to facilitate the absorption of the basic educational requirements in order to ensure that every student graduates with common knowledge. And that mission is plausible. However, out of the host of problems that standardized testing brings to the table, I want to talk about one in particular: Where is the creativity that once existed in education, and when will teachers have the freedom to nurture skills like creativity, critical thinking and collaboration?

Growing up primarily in the Houston public school system, I remember seeing my teacher follow TEKS, the set of daily applications teachers had to incorporate in their lessons for the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) test. These applications were restrictive and did not allow her to be the best educator she could be. When someone in the class asked one day if our class could go to the NASA Space Center to see the new Mars exhibition, we were all given an unfortunate rejection. “It doesn’t fit the curriculum,” she replied sadly. Instead, we sat bored and agitated watching a quick 30 minute Magic School Bus episode and that was the end of our discussion on space.

For most of my pre-college experience, I resented many of my teachers for being so restricting in how they taught. I remember growing up and reading the Roald Dahl novel “Matilda” and wanting my teachers to be just like Miss Honey. But instead they were Miss Trunchbulls when it came to keeping us cooped away in classrooms with hardly any exploration.

It wasn’t until my 8th grade year when I heard my history teacher slip out a profanity before we left class. Being the brat that I was during the time, I had to call him out on it. But then I realized that he was frustrated with the system in general and I sat astonished.

“I didn’t graduate from college to do this,” he spat. “I want to teach kids, not dictate them for a paycheck.”

I didn’t understand what he actually meant then, but today it makes so much sense. As a student mentor for Community School Student Partnerships (CSSP) in Philadelphia, I continue to see the disparity that takes place in the lives of youth in public education. The lack of exposure they get to have growing up in a time in their lives when it is very necessary. The reduced experiences that they won’t be able to encounter, simply because it isn’t in the curriculum, are vast.

And that is the problem with standardized testing, the fact that education has now become a manufactured process rather than a loving enrichment. Yes, students might be able to complete basic math and science problems on paper, but they will also become small robots regurgitating facts and lacking the motivation and concern to apply them to the real world.

Standardized testing eliminates creativity on both the student’s part and the teacher’s. Students are only able to express their efforts based on the much reduced expectations given to them, while teachers are forced to put aside the very superb skills they were hired for in the first place. While the government dictates the public school system, they fail to acknowledge the actual direct people involved. There has to be a better way.

Why is this important? Because if we encourage our youth to go to college, they have to start getting ready today. Life is not a multiple choice booklet that requires one answer only with a No. 2 pencil. Life is open-ended, filled with versatility and intrigue. Standardized testing does not give students this reality and thus makes the curriculum ineffective. I base this rationale on the following mantra: you can teach someone the facts, but if they can’t apply them, it’s useless. Let’s not standardize the future of the world but allow them to be as curious and open-minded as the society we want them to thrive in.

Please leave some thoughts in the comment box below! Help us get some conversation going on this important issue. You can also tweet at the author at @MrErnestOwens and at One World Youth Project at @owyp.

More of Ernest Owens addressing the hot issue of standardized testing:

Connecting with the world through the click of a button

Onika Stellingburg is a university student leader of One World Youth Project in Guyana, and a third-year student at the University of Guyana pursuing a Bachelors of Science Degree in Environmental Studies.

Written by Onika Stellingburg

Growing up in Guyana, a once isolated country in South America, I never would have envisioned that I could have a conversation with someone else my age 10,000 miles away with the click of a button. And yet, such an opportunity has afforded me some of my most formative experiences in recent years. I’d like to share my story on how I have been interacting with the larger global community through multimedia, and how the process of sharing my story with others through video technology has helped me develop global leadership and social responsibility in our changing world.

Public speaking is an avenue in my life where I am able to express myself through words and in front of the camera. I am extremely proud of where I come from and the blessed experiences I have had in my life. Freedom of speech, although a basic human right, is one which is not afforded to all young females around the world. As a young woman who has the opportunity to do so, I believe that I have been mandated to represent many other females who do not have this chance. I have the responsibility of communicating my experiences throughout my life, in college, at home and my learning moments in such a way that inspires other young girls what they can achieve in this world.

It is extremely meaningful to me to be able to communicate through multimedia, because it makes me appreciate all of the opportunities I am given to tell my story to anyone that is willing to hear it. The coming generations of tomorrow will have a lot of tools at their doorstep to take themselves to some distant place and put themselves at the top of the podium, or in front of the camera, speaking about their own experiences in life. This skill which I have honed through telling my own story to the media will greatly aid the future generations, in believing that they too can achieve greatness and reach for higher mountains.

One World Youth Project, an international education non-profit organization of which I am a student leader, has also facilitated my growth in public speaking and connecting with youth around the world through technology. The OWYP team has given me the opportunity to communicate with peers my age in the U.S., Kosovo, Turkey and Pakistan, as we share our stories, our histories, and things that motivate us in life. Through One World Youth Project’s efforts, several young people around the world will be able to connect with each other; we have been given the distinct opportunity of being our future global leaders in society.

As we listen to the voices of people around the world and interact with them, we get to put a human face to an otherwise unknown population. Videos get more personal, as people begin to open up with each other and new friendships are forged. Their stories serve to help me realize that although I am unique, I am not alone and neither am I an anomaly in this world. Everyday, other youths go through the same challenges and trials like I do, but we all have different ways of dealing with them. Whichever path we choose in life, it will shape our future permanently and impact our lives hopefully for the best.

My story can or the stories of those that I have connected with, can impact me in such a way that it motivates me to action. I am motivated to begin a lifestyle of change because I begin to understand the injustices faced by others like myself, and wish to ensure that their stories can help someone to cope with their own situation or help them to see that there is a way out of any struggle, problem, or mishap that they find themselves a part of.

We can never know the impact our story will have on someone else unless we share it. It is through the sharing of knowledge that we misconceptions, biases, generalizations and stereotypes are dispelled.

Only 1% of U.S. College Students Study Abroad: What This Means

I woke up this morning to an article about the Ecuadorian embassy protecting the Founder of wiki-leaks. I read with avid interest and did extensive research on the article -an article I would have hardly given a second glance about a year ago. As I tried to express to my friend what I thought was an extremely exciting and somewhat terrifying article, she could not understand my captivation with it. She reminded me that this scenario was just like the time that I ranted for days about the death of Lonely George the aged tortoise from the Galapagos Island.

It was then that it hit me. Ever since I returned from studying abroad in Ecuador, I had maintained a more than average interest in the film festivals, political events and even species extinctions that related to that nation. I even watched Manchester United football games with slightly more zest, keeping an eye on the Ecuadorian player Valencia, whose hometown I had visited while in Ecuador.

Over time I had adopted Ecuador as another home away from home. I had bonded with the very abstract yet personally meaningful subject that was ‘all things Ecuadorian’. It took me sometime to realize that you cannot live and learn somewhere without taking just a little bit of the place with you, adopting it in your character, opinions and even in your passions. When you study abroad you make a connection that personifies what previously seemed like unrelated statistics and distant media reports. Whether or not you enjoy, understand or even support everything about your host country the experience highlights the place on the world map and opens dialogue about the nations.

A place, cultural practice or issue you may never have considered now assumes a reality. The more of these connection you make the more global a citizen you become. Although I am inclined to converse with almost every Ecuadorian I meet here, the truth is that they are not all my friends and just because I have visited a nation does not mean I know everything about it and everyone from it. Nonetheless that which I do know and understand of its people, its flavors, its music and shortcomings, which puts me in a relationship with a completely different culture from mine.

This is the kind of relationship that cultivates global citizenship is the kind of relationship OWYP tries to provide, even for students who cannot afford to study abroad. The video below is of one of OWYP’s summer interns, Miranda Morrison, expressing her views on how only 1% of American university and college students study abroad, the ramifications of limiting this opportunity and her ideas for possible solutions.