I’ve spent the past week training the teachers in our four pilot schools in Tashkent. Everyday this week we’ve done 2 hour long trainings with the teachers. It struck me during these sessions that teachers are really no different than students in regard to their classroom behavior. Each of these trainings had about 30 teachers present. I’d guess about half of them really wanted to be there, a quarter were interested but not committed to doing the exercises, and the final quarter didn’t want to be there at all but were told by their principal to attend.
Even though I asked everyone to silence their phones and put them away at the beginning of the session, I still had numerous “students” who continued to use their phones. One woman was playing Candy Crush, while another woman was watching a YouTube video about arthritis treatments! I repeatedly had to ask these teachers to put their phones away or to stop having side conversations. I was surprised by this behavior because I gave specific instructions to each school administrator NOT to force any teachers to participate as that would be counterproductive. Clearly, that message didn’t get through as strongly as it needed to.
I have one more day long training with all of the teachers together during their Spring break. I’m going to have to reinforce this message and take stronger measures, like asking participants to leave the training, if this behavior continues. I would never tolerate such lack of attention in my courses in the States, and I know from my Uzbek team members, that most Uzbek teachers wouldn’t accept this behavior from their students either. We will see how it goes.
I’m also preparing to give a number of talks for various venues and events coming up. I’ll be giving a talk on bullying and criminal behavior at the prosecutor’s college, doing a talk on Stress Management at the National Library through the US Embassy’s English outreach program, and giving the Keynote address at a summit on Empowering Girls.
Speaking of female empowerment, we had a nice taste of home this week thanks to the US Embassy in Tashkent. They hosted a showing of the new Captain Marvel movie in English at a local theater. Not only was it a really great movie, it was nice to see a new movie in English surrounded by pretty much every American currently living in Tashkent.
Beyond that I am working to set up a travel schedule for me to visit key regions of Uzbekistan outside of Tashkent in order to train school psychologists around the country in Positive Psychology and Stress Management techniques. I have a feeling the next two months are going to be extremely busy.
Experience Fulbright 