A Teacher Learns a Lesson of His Own

It was a great conversation starter. The discussions began to arise in January or February, and by April, every time I bumped into someone walking across the Yard it seemed that the first question after "How are you?" was "What are you doing this summer?"

I have to admit that I loved this question, and it was not pride or conceit but rather a kind of benign excitement that I felt when I told my friends that I was going to live in an Aboriginal community in Central Australia, where I would teach Aboriginal children how to read.

In June I arrived at Atitjere, a community of 250 people deep in the heart of the Simpson desert. The first day of our program I sat on the steps of the temporary building that served as the community school and eagerly awaited my pupils. They straggled in one by one, curious but shy. They reacted to my cheerful greetings by retracting their heads into their t-shirts like turtles into a shell, or by whispering to one another in Arrente, the local language. The children had no interest in reading that day; instead, they had simply heard that a bunch of "whitefellas" were going to be at the school and were curious to see them.

I went home that evening very troubled. As I sat on the porch of our trailer home, I tried to reconcile the romantic vision of public service that I had created prior to my arrival with the reality that I had discovered.

In the days and weeks that followed, I became more familiar with the community, its mores and its way of life. In the evenings, my friends John and Willy would take me hunting for kangaroo, and Willy, who at 14 was already the tribe's witchdoctor, would point out features of the landscape and tell me the tribal legends about each of them.

I grew to know a vibrant culture, and I grew to admire a group of people who had neither interest in nor need for "white man's magic"--education. When I wanted to read, the kids suggested that we play basketball--all 50 of us--and usually the kids won out.

If a Harvard education is a gift (and I think it is), then it is also a responsibility. I think most of us feel that responsibility even now. Phillips Brooks House is easily the largest organization on campus, with about one fifth of the student body participating in its programs. And the number of students who opt to defy Harvard's covert and not-so covert attempts to point all of us toward careers in consulting and investment banking in favor of jobs "with a conscience" is fast rising.

But our social responsibility extends beyond simply volunteering for a tutoring program or applying for a job with a non-profit. It extends beyond finding a program that will allow us to become part of what has increasingly become a kind of chic associated with socially responsible pursuits. There are a lot of us who are tempted to feel that, as long as we are volunteering for an organization we believe in, we are doing our part and helping others. I'm just no longer sure this is true.

I recall that one evening while we were out hunting, I sat down with John to watch the desert sunset. John was 14 and had stopped attending school the year before. I asked him why. He said he didn't need it. And as I looked into the sunset over the gnarled gum trees, I tried desperately to formulate a response. I couldn't. I couldn't disagree with him.

Sure, I could have told him about the mysteries of science and the magical stories of history, and I could have explained to him that in order to get a job in town and escape the third-world living conditions of the community he would need to know how to read and do basic math. But the truth was John didn't want to work in town. He never wanted to leave the community of Atitjere, and he was happy enough with the legends that his grandmother told him and the wondrous science of his cousin, the witchdoctor.

Education is my life, and to John it meant nothing. And although it seemed self-defeating to admit it, I really couldn't say that I wanted to change that. John didn't desire to read, and I didn't have the desire or hubris to tell him that he was wrong.

This realization was tough. It had never occurred to me that literacy training, at least in the form that I had planned, was not the most effective way for me to serve the children of Atitjere. For me, it turned out that the basketball, softball and rugby games were the most valuable educational experiences. In the last week at Atitjere, some of the kids wrote stories with me that became a kind of tribal Sports Illustrated.

It wasn't what I had envisioned, but the stories captured the sense of community that was so ubiquitous in those group sports events. I learned from that experience the lesson that kids will take more interest in learning if their learning activities allow self-reference--and I can use that lesson in my service activities back at Harvard.

But I also learned that a commitment to service is better understood as a commitment to people, and that it requires not only dedication, but the ability to adapt to and understand the real needs of others.

My personal commitment to education did not diminish this summer, but my ability to evaluate my service efforts within a social and cultural context certainly increased. The kids at Atitjere weren't looking for someone to help them read. They were looking for someone to understand them. Daniel B. Baer '00 is a social studies and Afro-American studies concentrator in Quincy House.