Maryknoll offers teachers a learning experience

Guatemala immersion trip an opportunity to proclaim the good news

BY ARMANDO MACHADO

Father Tom Marti, Director of the Seattle office of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, is pictured with Columban Father Charles Coulter, left, in Santiago Atitlan, Guatemala in 2006. Photo: courtesy Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers

In 2006 Father Tom Marti had firsthand experience in learning about "the culture and faith life" of the people of Guatemala as a member of a group of U.S. priests on a pilgrimage/retreat to Central America. Now he is leading a program to bring the same opportunity to Catholic school teachers within the Archdiocese of Seattle and elsewhere.

Father Marti, director of the Seattle office of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, has organized a Guatemala immersion experience for Catholic school teachers in June.

"It should be a great opportunity, a great experience for the participants," he said in a recent interview. "I would counsel them to be very open to learning about the life and the culture, the faith and the values of other people. This should be an enriched, nurturing experience for them when they return. They would be able to be more effective as teachers, expanding the knowledge of other people."

Father Marti added that the immersion trip "is related to our Lord's commission to go forth to the whole world and proclaim the good news, reaching out to others, bringing that good news of God's love."

Global solidarity
The eight-day Guatemala visit begins June 19. The program, which was promoted as a way for parish schools to better connect with God's mission of global solidarity, peace, and justice, attracted nine teachers.

Daniele Nelson, who teaches first and second grades at Holy Rosary School in Tacoma, is one of the Catholic educators from the Archdiocese of Seattle going on the immersion journey.

"I decided to go on the Guatemala Immersion trip to gain a better understanding of the Guatemalan culture and customs, especially those related to education," Nelson said. "This is very important to me because next year we will be launching a new bilingual program entitled the Juan Diego Academy."

Beginning next fall, students enrolling in Juan Diego Academy will receive instruction in bilingual classrooms.

"We will be the first bilingual Catholic school in the state of Washington," said Nelson. "I am interested in learning more and more about Hispanic communities."

One of the things Nelson is hoping to gain from the Guatemala immersion trip is a better understanding of the cultural background of some students she will be working with this year and in years to come. She said mission work has always been a passion of hers, and that she enjoys traveling to learn about and serve God's people, especially those in need.

"I know the basics," she said, "and I am definitely looking forward to learning more of the Spanish language. And I look forward to using it in my classroom."

More immersions to come
This is the first immersion designed specifically for Catholic school teachers, according to Kevin Foy, mission promotion coordinator for Maryknoll in Seattle.

Kevin Foy

"We hope, though, to continue immersions for teachers in the years to come."

Participating teachers receive professional development through Maryknoll as part of the immersion program, which Maryknoll hopes will raise awareness of poverty in other parts of the world.

Foy, who will accompany the teachers, said the Guatemala immersion trip was opened up to out-of-state teachers in order to make it a national program. The immersion group will include five teachers from the Archdiocese of Seattle; two from the Diocese of Houston, Texas; one from the Diocese of Erie, Penn.; and one from the Diocese of Knoxville, Tenn.

Kate Healy, a middle school teacher at Our Lady of Lourdes School in Vancouver who will participate in the immersion trip said she doesn't speak Spanish, and so will rely on bilingual participants to assist with communication. But she noted that people can communicate that they care without words and she will be doing plenty of that.

Like other group members she feels "very blessed and fortunate" and plans to share her experiences with students and staff on her return.

"Something about this mission trip, and how Maryknoll presented it, really called to me," Healy said. "The school is really supporting me on this trip. I'm really excited to be able to experience this and bring it back."

J.L. Drouhard, director of the archdiocesan Missions Office, said the Guatemala immersion trip "is a chance to help form teachers, and then their students, in their call to be missioners, as we all are, called out of our baptism...The hope is that teachers return with an experience that enriches all of us in mission to each other here and beyond our borders."

May 10, 2012