November 2002

Dear Family and Friends,

I thought you might be interested to know in a little more detail what kind of work I do. Usually I only complain about the marking and mention being busy. In the last six months, I have been involved in two major projects through which students potentially learn more about being a contributing member of our world.

Every spring since I have been teaching grade 12 English, we have had a world literature symposium. The whole senior class is organised into groups of three, and each group makes a short list of an author or topic from world literature, contemporary or classic. Each group is assigned a topic from the short list, and then each person chooses a literary text (commonly known as a book) to read and study. So each student is working independently, but has a small group of fellows who are working generally on the same topic. They can support each other through discussion and sharing of ideas. Each student then must write a paper pursuing some idea s/he has about the book read. Finding an original idea and thesis is part of the challenge, and for high school students it is often a daring risk and departure from mere gathering of information that we so often have them do.

For a complete list of the topics and books read, click here.

Guests are invited to hear the presentations, which adds interest. It is a good closing exercise for seniors heading all over the world for college in a few weeks. I was very proud of what the students attempted and achieved. They read everything from Salman Rushdie to William Faulkner, from Amin Maalouf's Samarkhand to Tennessee William's "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof." The list of topics is in a box on this page.

The other more recent project was our annual activity week. Every fall semester students go to different places in north India to explore our surroundings. This year I took 23 students from 10th and 11th grades to Allahabad, a 20-hour, overnight train journey from Dehra Dun.

Allahabad is in eastern Uttar Pradesh and is important for religious and historical reasons. The Ganga and Yamuna Rivers meet there and, as the Ganga, flow on to Calcutta and the Bay of Bengal. There is also a mythical holy river, the Saraswati, that joins them in Allahabad and therefore the place where all three meet, the Sangam, is the holiest place in India for ritual bathing, praying, and immersing the ashes of loved ones. On auspicious occasions, millions of people gather at this spot.

We explored the Rural Development Project of the non-formal education section of what is now Deemed University. A Presbyterian missionary, Samuel Higginbottom, founded in 1910 the institute that became Deemed University. This project was begun and developed by Kazuo and Yukiko Makino, Japanese missionaries who have worked in India since the Sixties. All three of their children came to Woodstock. I mention this because of the interconnectedness of Woodstock's work with so much of the other work that has gone on in India and surrounding countries over the last 100 years. Presently, the PC(USA)'s Hunger Program contributes to their work.

The Woodstock students went into villages and saw rural development. We visited village schools under the trees, investigated hand-pump projects, did some kitchen gardening, and drank tea with tulsi in it. Then in the evenings, our students taught in Asha Niketan (place of hope), a night school for Harijan (Untouchable) child labourers. In their journals, most of group felt the teaching was the highlight of the week for them, a chance "to give something." Many of the Woodstock students were seeing "country" things for the first time. As a farm girl, this was often astonishing and amusing for me. But many of them felt stirrings, recognising and appreciating how much they have, but also wanting to in some way help others, not just now, but in their future careers.

These are the kinds of seeds Woodstock plants, seeds that help young people identify with other people, people unlike themselves.

Thank you for your part your support of Worldwide Ministries and Global Education and International Leadership, support in gifts, interest, hope, and prayers.

May you experience the joy of the season of giving, by giving something of yourself to those around you.

Love,

Kathy

The 2002 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 154