Getting to Know Your International Contacts

Unfortunately, I still have yet to hear from any of professionals outside of the U.S. that I have tried to contact. I have to admit that it has been an ongoing process over the last couple of weeks and it just seems like it isn’t going to be successful. So until I am able to do so, I have resorted to the alternative assignments.

I visited the World Forum Foundation’s website and listened to their most recent podcast (2-10-11). A conversation was held with Susan Lyon. She discussed that her passion for early childhood all started when a child suggested that the word “city” was a small word for such a big thing. She went to Italy and visited the Reggio Emilia school systems and decided to bring their concepts back with her to northern California. She started a program in 1994 called the Innovative Teacher Project. It consists of a network of schools from all over the world communicating every month about their progress in changing their school systems. These school systems are both public and private. It still continues today.

I also reviewed the Childhood Poverty Research and Policy Centre’s page (http://www.childhoodpoverty.org/) and specifically research childhood poverty in China. I was interested in this area due to its huge population of 1,336,718,015 (as of mid 2011). Poverty in China has declined from 250 million in 1978 to 35 million in 2000. It is mainly in the urban areas due to adults not being able to find work, a dismantling of the social security system, and movement of rural-urban migration. People who work in urban areas give small contributions to cover insurance for those in poverty but it excludes most of the poor residents. There are different government assistance programs (dibao), but it mainly reaches just 20-25% of the poor. These systems give households a certain amount of money based on family size, but it doesn’t take into consideration the specific needs of each member. For instance, one family may be a single mother raising three children or a disabled child. Certain members may cost more money for certain reasons. As family size increases, the more dependent members become. Many children don’t have medical insurance and suffer illnesses, which in turn lead to financial debt. The first nine years of children’s education is free, but even with this fact 75% of families in poverty can’t afford education expenses. Therefore, many children don’t finish school. Some even end up leaving to go work at very early ages.

Based on what I’ve learned so far in this course, poverty exists in every country. There seems to be an issue with not being able to reach all of the poor population, no matter what area is being considered.