The Kuhnes met at a Peace Corps Fourth of July celebration in Guatemala.

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By Admin1 (admin) on Sunday, July 01, 2001 - 3:33 pm: Edit Post

The Kuhnes met at a Peace Corps Fourth of July celebration in Guatemala.



The Kuhnes met at a Peace Corps Fourth of July celebration in Guatemala.

Teaching the teachers

The Kuhnes, who met at a Peace Corps Fourth of July celebration in Guatemala, chose Temple's Fellows in Education program because it's one of the few that provides master's degrees in both secondary and elementary education. Both are in their second year of the two-year program.

Peace Corps experience helps Temple students adjust to rigors of teaching Philadelphia school children

Not enough staplers? Not enough attendance sheets? Not enough books? Not a problem.

George Kuhne, former Peace Corps volunteer, is used to doing without a lot of amenitieselectricity and an automobile among them. So when he started the school year at Strawberry Mansion Middle-Senior High School sans a few supplies, it was no big deal.

It wasn't a big deal for Julie Kuhne, his wife, either. The first-year second grade teacher at Elkin Elementary School is making herself right at home in her bilingual classroom, sharing the joys of math, reading and art projects with her 28 students.

The Peace Corps, it seems, taught them well.

As participants in Temple's Peace Corps Fellows in Education Program, George, 28, and Julie, 25, who met while serving in the Peace Corps in Guatemala, are earning their master's degrees and teaching certificates while teaching in city schools.

The Fellows Program operates on the belief that Peace Corps veterans have developed many of the skills necessary to teach America's most challenged pupils.

In his biology and environmental classroom at Strawberry Mansion, the resourcefulness George developed in 28 months teaching farmers about soil conservation in Guatemala is helping him as he teaches ninth-graders about cells and cytoplasm, ecology and erosion.

"You've got to use some ingenuity sometimes," said George, who served in Guatemala 1993-95, living alone in a house on a mountain without electricity. He traveled the countryside by horse.

"The Peace Corps gives you experience with other cultures," he said. "You have to learn how to work with that culture. Having been in Guatemala, I'm more open to cultural differences."

Likewise, Julie, also a Peace Corps veteran who served in Guatemala, said her experience teaching women about nutrition is helping her get settled in her elementary classroom.

"I worked with women's groups, teaching basic nutrition at social meetings and cooking demonstrations," said Julie, a Connecticut native who holds a degree in nutrition and dietetics from the University of Connecticut.

She explained that she chose the Peace Corps because she wanted to live in another culture, learn a new language and share her knowledge with others.

"I felt like the knowledge I had I could really use to help people," she said. "My Peace Corps experience has prepared me for teaching. I'm a lot more resourceful now than I had been before I left for Guatemala."

Resourcefulness, creativity, resiliency and the ability to work in challenging, multi-cultural environments are some of the qualities that make returning Peace Corps volunteers excellent teachers in urban settings, according to Dr. David X. Fitt, coordinator of Temple's Fellows in Education Program.

"Returning Peace Corps volunteers seem to have a natural ability to motivate and educate students," said Dr. Fitt. "Their overseas experiences proved to be a real test of their ability to observe and adapt while developing skills needed to motivate others."

The Kuhnes, who met at a Peace Corps Fourth of July celebration in Guatemala, chose Temple's Fellows in Education program because it's one of the few that provides master's degrees in both secondary and elementary education. Both are in their second year of the two-year program.

As they teach in the Philadelphia school system and work toward their master's degrees and teaching certificates, Temple's Peace Corps Fellows receive 66 percent tuition remission.

Founded in 1992, the Fellows Program has received a new, three-year grant from the DeWitt Wallace-Reader's Digest Pathways to Teaching Careers Program, which will help fund the program into the year 2001.

"Our experience with the Peace Corps Fellows has demonstrated that they have the ability to serve as a vital link between the school classroom, parents and the community," says Dr. Fitt.

"These volunteers have brought this talent home and they are putting it to good use in local classrooms."

George adds: "My students are very curious about my Peace Corps experience. They have a lot of questions, especially when they find out I had no TV. They can't imagine why someone would want to do that."

But at home, neither George nor Julie has to explain their affinity for the Peace Corps experience.

-- By Barbara Baals



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