Study Abroad in Venezuela with Global Exchange

Want to study in Venezuela and learn some Spanish? Since you can’t find everything on the internet, we recommend traveling to Venezuela. We promise you won’t find an opportunity like this one anywhere else.

Global Exchange provides a unique opportunity to English-speaking students to get to know Venezuela in a beautiful town located at the foot of Andes.  Mérida is a popular tourist destination and home to the Universidad de Los Andes.

The fall and spring semester academic programs are designed to increase students’ knowledge of contemporary Venezuelan society. The goal is to create links and build bridges between advocates of social justice in the global North and like-minded people in Latin America. Global’s motto is “building people to people ties”, and you’ll leave Venezuela with lots of new friends.

The 12-week program is built around intensive Spanish language training, essential for anyone serious about getting to know the people of the patria querida. Courses focus on Venezuelan history, culture, and politics. You can earn 15 undergraduate or graduate credits while engaging with contemporary and alternative development issues inside and outside the classroom.

Frequent exchanges with community leaders involved in social change on the ground make this a truly one-of-a-kind experience. The people at Global Exchange have worked within the communities of Mérida for many years. They know the terrain, and can’t wait to show you around!

Here’s the link to learn more.

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Venezuelan Woman Promotes Intercultural Education

Intercultural education will soon become a reality in Venezuela, if Professor Angela Diaz has anything to do with it.

She spoke at at a public event today in Washington sponsored by TransAfrica Forum. Diaz has been making her way around the U.S. capital,  speaking at Howard University and meeting Members of Congress to discuss the Afro-Venezuelan experience.

Diaz is a member of the Network of Afro-Venezuelan Organizations (La Red de Organizaciones Afrovenezolanas), has worked tirelessly over the past decade to help create a more inclusive education system. Like the U.S., Afro-descendants and Indigenous peoples in Venezuela have been too often distorted or omitted from public school curricula. Due to the work of people like Diaz, Venezuelan students will learn about all the ethnic groups that built the South American continent.

The new inclusive curriculum has been implemented in 17 states so far. Part of the process involves inviting community elders into the schools to teach.  In one school, grandparents taught students how to make a fish recipe, which is stuffed in a plantain leaf. Fish is a vital resource for residents along the Caribbean coast, many of whom identify as Afro-Venezuelan. Along with the recipe, the children learned about history, culture, art, and the environment. Sharing ancestral knowledge is the key to transmitting what has been left out of the history books.

Diaz emphasized that students are inspired when they can see themselves and their communities represented in their lessons. See more of Professor Diaz’s work with Fundación Curduvare.

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Venezuela’s “El Sistema” Inspires Music in Michigan

Venezuela’s successful state-funded youth music education program, “El Sistema,” continues to have an impact abroad. Most recently, it inspired a similar initiative by the Jackson Symphony Orchestra in Michigan. Their program, called “String Team,” offers affordable group classes in stringed instruments to elementary school students.

Venezuela’s “El Sistema” has reached about a quarter of a million young people in poor areas and produced classical music stars such as Gustavo Dudamel. Like “El Sistema,” the  “String Team” is about getting young people to learn and improve their lives through music. Read more here. In case you missed it, don’t forget to check out the documentary about “El Sistema” on CBS’ 60 Minutes.

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Five New Public Universities to Open in Venezuela

UNESCO’s Institute of Statistics says that Venezuela has the second-highest rate of university enrollment in Latin America. At 83% enrollment, Venezuela is second only to Cuba, and far above the regional average of just 30%, Radio Nacional de Venezuela reports.

To keep up the momentum, Venezuela is opening several new institutions of higher education this year.

Last Tuesday, President Chavez announced that the following five new public universities would soon open their doors: The University of Hydrocarbons, National University of Security Studies, University of the Peoples of the South, School of Telecommunications and Computer Science, and University Institute of Civil Aviation.

Venezuela’s National Council of Universities has also approved 22 new majors in everything ranging from tourism to nursing to petroleum and sugar engineering.

Much of the progress made on education in Venezuela can be attributed to the country’s social missions, which have helped change the lives of millions of citizens. “Mission Alma Mater” builds new universities and learning spaces to meet the needs of the increasing number of students seeking higher education. “Mission Sucre” has greatly expanded the country’s higher education system, with the goal of granting universal access to public universities.

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Britain Learns from Venezuela’s Bolivarian Schools

After all the buzz about Venezuela’s music education program, “El Sistema,” here is something new and different: teachers from England are coming to Caracas to witness the successes of Venezuela’s free “Bolivarian” schools.

The BBC reports on the “Connecting Classrooms” initiative that provides an exchange program for instructors from Britain and Venezuela.

Here is what Steven Connors, a teacher from Hertfordshire, England, had to say about the Boliviarian schools:

Although they’re in tough parts of town, what we found was that the schools were serving their communities in the most amazing way. They were oases of calm and order where children are able to get that one life opportunity to get an education.

Another teacher, David Winters of London, said:

Where they are very strong is in the area of values, in instilling in their pupils the belief that when they grow up they must be better citizens and must not allow the situation which exists at the moment in Caracas to continue. They want the children to strive for a better future, and a better future will mean that the population in general is at less risk of crime and of criminality.

The Boliviarian school system now incorporates about 9 million Venezuelan students, from the elementary school level through university. It is part of the push to democratize access to education, and also an important part of government anti-poverty efforts. To read more, click here.

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More Praise for ‘The Dude’ from Venezuela

Yesterday, the Washington Post reported on Gustavo Dudamel, the classical music conductor who — along with the state-funded music education “sistema” in Venezuela that he champions — is becoming muy famoso.

El Sistema takes children, often from circumstances of abject poverty, and teaches them to play instruments. According to most press reports, there are more than 250,000 children in El Sistema right now — its Web site cites 350,000 — playing in group classes and youth orchestras culminating in the Bolívar orchestra, which Dudamel will bring to Washington on April 6.

The Post credits Dudamel with “bringing a breath of fresh air to the familiar.” It also turns a critical eye to Dudamel’s family life, pressing him to explain why he refers to his musical endeavors as so many “wives.”

Does he extend this kind of morality to his real wife, the journalist and former dancer Eloísa Maturén? “No, no, no, no!” he said, laughing, and amended his description of the orchestras: “It’s polygamy, but in a beautiful way.”

So there you have it. ‘The Dude’ comes out on top again!

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Venezuela Becoming “A Nation of Readers”

Venezuela’s International Book Fair arrives in Caracas tomorrow. It has toured all 24 of the country’s states, and makes its final stop Friday in Parque Los Caobos.

The fourth annual event involves more than just the buying and selling of books — it also includes educational events and workshops on a wealth of topics, including science fiction writing, fantasy literature, and publishing alternative media. More than 400 writers and artists from 20 countries are participating, as well as 150 different publishers.

The International Book Fair celebrates the achievements of the many thousands of students and educators who helped make Venezuela an “illiteracy free territory” in 2003. Social programs in education have indeed increased the country’s demand for books.

The President of the National Book Center, Marisela Guevara, says the fair shows that Venezuela is becoming “a nation of readers.” Read more in Spanish here.

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Venezuela and China Launch “Simón Bolivar” Satellite

It’s official! Venezuela’s social revolution takes to the skies today with the launch of the satellite dubbed “Simon Bolivar” in remembrance of the independence leader.

The BBC reported that this telecommunications tool will cover all of Latin America and be used, ideally by many countries, “to enhance regional integration and also for social programmes such as tele-education and tele-medicine.” Click on the BBC link to watch an informative video.

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Venezuela Elected to UN Economic and Social Council

Today is an exciting and historic day for Venezuela, as it was elected a member of the United Nations Economic and Social Council. ECOSOC is a vitally important coordinating body of the United Nations and serves as a “central forum for the discussion of economic and social issues.”

Venezuela “will have the opportunity to show the world the importance of the social projects being implemented from the South”, said Ruben Dario Molina of the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry.

Venezuela will begin its service in ECOSOC on January 1, 2009. During its 3 year term, Venezuela will work with the nations of the world to:

-promote higher standards of living, full employment, and economic and social progress

-identify solutions to international economic, social and health problems

-facilitate international cultural and educational cooperation

-encourage universal respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms

Venezuela has been leading by example for the last decade, and now has the chance to share that experience with the world.

Click here to learn more about ECOSOC and here for more information about Venezuela’s election to the Council.

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Venezuelan Conductors Invade U.S. Classical Music Scene

Venezuela’s Gustavo Dudamel is on his way to becoming a household name. He is credited with reviving classical music, and will surely gain more attention when he assumes his post as conductor of the L.A. Philharmonic Orchestra in 2009.

It so happens that another Venezuelan conductor, Eduardo Marturet (pictured above), heads up the Miami Symphony Orchestra. Though Marturet honed his music skills abroad in Europe, he later returned to Venezuela and preceded Dudamel as director of Venezuela’s Youth Symphony Orchestra through 1995. More recently, in 2006, his “Encantamento” won a Latin Grammy for Best Classical Album.

The Miami Symphony Orchestra began its 20th season last Saturday. The first performance featured a star performer, the violinist Alexis Cardenas, who is a also Venezuelan. Watch him wow the crowd in the video below.

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NYU Students Put Posada Carriles on Trial

On October 6, 1976, 73 people were killed in the bombing of Cubana Airlines flight 455. To mark the 22nd anniversary of this tragic loss of life, the New York University chapter of the National Lawyer’s Guild staged a tribunal of the man accused of this and other acts of terrorism. Luis Posada Carriles, a former CIA agent and current Miami resident, is wanted in several countries including Venezuela.

“Hopefully people will listen to this, and there will be more discussion about it,” said a student who watched the tribunal.

You be the judge:

Read coverage of the NYU event here and listen to historical evidence presented at the trial by Jane Franklin (about 32 minutes into this recording). If you want to read more, check out this L.A. Times editorial. Use the comments section to tell us what you think.

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Venezuela Buys Laptops for Little People

This is an exciting story on the education and technology front: Venezuela signed a deal with Portugal last weekend to buy 1 million affordable laptop computers to place in schools across the country.

The first delivery will consist of 250,000 of the kid-friendly laptops (Intel’s Classmate PC), and the rest are expected by the end of 2009. This is the single largest purchase of these new computers to be made so far by any country in the world.

Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates said, “It’s a lot more than exporting computers. It’s about cooperating with Venezuela to set up a program similar to what we have in Portugal. The aim is to improve education.”

The computers run on Linux software, an open-source technology supported by the Venezuelan government. Read more from AP, AFP and BBC.

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