Hey all! This is Cory Myrtil, the leader of the day! I’m here to share a quick summary and photos from Education/Politics Day! Today was the first day a Global Glimpse student was appointed El Lider Del Dia (ELDD). I had the honor of leading the students through a day full of touring and conversations with students and political officials.

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

            ~Nelson Mandela

For the education part of the day we started with an Educational Seminar ran by one of our two lovely Global Glimpse leaders; Ms. Franks. There we talked about the statistics of Dominican education where Ms. Franks talked about how many people in the country are illiterate, had to dropout due to family responsibilities among other facts. We then had a creative activity where we got into groups and were assigned a national organization that aimed toward better education and had to provide a mission statement to Ms. Franks who would then “approve” the amount of money we were asking her to fund us.

Jordi, Julian, Corey, and others putting DR history facts in chronological order.

Jordi, Julian, Corey, and others putting DR history facts in chronological order.

From the seminar the students who we call G-squared, hopped on the bus and headed to Universidad Autonoma de Santo Domingo (UASD). When we got to the university we met up some students, Natasha, Nelly, and Danny who talked about the history of the Bonao branch of the college, information about admissions, and were nice enough to answer the questions G-squared had concerning education in D.R. After a quick tour of UASD we went into a classroom where we met one of the teachers Jose and other UASD students. From there we had an icebreaker where we sang around in a circle our names; just to get to know one another.

After the icebreaker we played a game where we passed around the ball and played music, when the music stopped the person with the ball would have to answer a question. We would answer a question they had about the United States and after we answer the question we would ask a question we had about D.R. As the leader I tried to make sure the questions that the G-squared’s question centered on education since that was the first theme of the day. After the questions game we had a closing game where we split up in two teams. Each member of the teams would hold hands and try to have a hoola hoop travel down the line, after the hoola hoop traveled down the last person in the line would run to the white board and write a word either in Spanish or English trying to write it faster than the other group.

When the game was done, we said thank you and I as the leader presented the teacher with a present on behalf of the Global Glimpse program and our delegation. From there we went back on the bus with our lovely bus driver Ronald and headed to the Foundacion! That was the end of the education part of the day!

The accomplice to the crime of corruption is often our own complacency.”

            ~Bess Myerson

The start of the Politics part of the day started with a seminar ran by Ms. David and Ms. Franks. We talked about corruption and the relationship between the population and the government. I tried to remind G-squared that in a developing country like D.R the relationship between the people and the politicians are basically non-existing in the sense that they are not fully aware or educated in what affairs are truly going on within the government.

After that seminar we were back on the bus headed to the Governor’s office where we talked to Freddy and Martin who are both actively involved in the politics group of Bonao. We talked about the political parties specifically, the ones that Freddy and Martin are in which are PLD and PRD. Martin who is actually running for office shared with us his point of view on the political situation in D.R and why he thinks certain aspect are affecting the citizens of this country. After our conversation we thanked them and gifted them with Global Glimpse shirts and headed back to the Foundacion for self-reflection.

When self-reflection was done, we started our program seminar for what is to come tomorrow. We introduced our two leaders for tomorrow Sammy and Clara who gave us an overview of what our day will consist of tomorrow and what we are expected to wear and bring. Tomorrow’s theme will be Family Exchange, which will be summarized on our blog tomorrow by Clara and Sammy! On behalf of all the students I will like to say hello, we are doing well and hope to talk to all of you very soon!

Buena Noches!

~Cory