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Peace Corps volunteer Tom Mechtenberg is improving the odds for St. Lucian students with special needs
Peace Corps volunteer Tom Mechtenberg is improving the odds for St. Lucian students with special needs
Soufriere, St. Lucia
Visual Domain, Ltd.
While Western tourists bask in the sun and gorgeous scenery of this jewel of the Caribbean, Peace Corps volunteer Tom Mechtenberg is on a more serious mission: improving the odds for St. Lucian students with special needs.
"Their education system has never had a special program of any sort for children with mild or moderate mental or learning disabilities," says Mechtenberg, a former school social worker from Port Huron, Michigan. "Those kids have been left on their own in the regular classroom. Most teachers have at least 30 students in their classes, so they weren't getting any kind of special attention."
Mechtenberg's main priority is helping St. Lucians create more support services for these children. He works with school principals, provides training for interested teachers in monthly workshops, and models lessons in the classroom. Halfway through his two-year Peace Corps assignment, Tom's also introduced an assessment tool to diagnose students' strengths and weaknesses and is currently working with teachers on using a new skill-building program in reading.
Peace Corps volunteer Tom Mechtenberg.
In one school last year where they were able to set up a resource room staffed by a teacher full-time, "We saw big improvements," says Mechtenberg. "The kids got more attention, and they wanted to be there for more than an hour a day." Unfortunately, not all the schools he works with could devote a full-time teacher to work with special-needs students, so the gains there have been harder to come by.
Tom's wife Mary, a former nurse, also volunteers for the Peace Corps, working in AIDS/HIV prevention. The couple lives in the lower level of a rented house in Soufriere that has a spectacular view of the Pitons (the twin peaks highlighted in all the tourist brochures) and get their exercise from the one-mile hike uphill to their home. Tom is also copy editor of a quarterly news magazine, Serious Ting, circulated among Peace Corps volunteers in the Caribbean.
"Overall, the experience has been gratifying," says Mechtenberg. "I'm happy that I've been able to use my experience in special education to start a new program here. I've also gained a new appreciation for the quality of life we enjoy in the United States. You have to take the long view, and the long view is that progress takes time."
You can reach Tom at mechtenbergs@hotmail.com.