Global Village Course - Bob Mazelow and Peter Hayes

This course, taught to seniors in the spring term, is a general survey of world isues, with a particular focus on the role and responsibilities of students as citizens. Questions of how people treat one another and how people treat the rest of nature are interwoven throughout the course. Disciplines which are included in the course include: economics, history, political science, anthropology, sociology, "hard" sciences, and geography.

The main "throughline" questions include:

Where is the world headed - what does this have to do with us and what do we have to do with it?

What are the most significant areas of uncertainty; what is shaping the eveolution ofthese issues, and what are the most sensible solutions?

Is there a relationship between how people treat one another and how they treat the rest of nature?

What is Done:

The course begins with a recent article from the Atlantic Monthly, "The Coming Anarchy" in which the author uses the situation in West African to support his thesis that human use of nature has become the central determining issue in world affairs.

The first half of the course is focused on preparing students to participate in the Model United Nations conference held in Berkeley. In 1996, the group was selected to represent Nigeria and in the 1997 conference they will be divided between Nigeria and Indonesia. As part of the preparation the group investigates the case of the Ogoni people in the oil rich lands of the the Niger River Delta. This is the first of several role playing situations which are used to both investigate the multisided nature of these contentious cases and to encourage students to look at they from some point of view other than their own. Following the Ogoni case the group joined with the African American Studies course for an investigation of environmental justice cases on the local, national and global scale.

Because questions of population growth and food supply surface throughout the course, a unit on these topics is presented in the center of the course. Again, a science based, multiple perspective, problem solving approach is used.

A large part of the the final weeks of the course is devoted to an investigation of an ongoing tropical forest/aboriginal peoples question in Sarawak in northern Borneo. For several years, this project has been done in cooperation with a class in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia with the help of the internet. For more information, see this article.

A final unit investigated, common pool resources and the challenges of conserving them and using them. Examples studied included underground water, such as the Ogallala Aquafer, the atmosphere, and open ocean fisheries with a paricular focus on Pacific Tuna.

The course ends with each student making a personal statement about their view of the future ofthe world and what they see to be their role and responsibility in it.

What Gained:

Though we know that what students gain is both variable and difficult to accurately know, we hope and feel that they gain some of the following:

A clear sense of how their lives and human life both depends on and influences earth's communities of life,

Experience is investigating any question from multiple perspectives and seeng how culture influences our view of the world,

A basic understanding of the dual challenges of population growth and the supply of food and water.

An understanding of the relationship between the world's least and most developed nations,

How the UN works and what is can and cannot do,

A view of the world as a "village" where nothing can be considered in isolation,

The skill of using the internet as a tool for learning and communication.

A sense of the relationship between world issues and their own lives, and a sense that the choices they make and can make do make a difference.

What Has Helped:

The chance to cooperate on the teaching of the course over several years; this allows for continued refinement and improvement.

Making active use of outside resources, particularly guest speakers.

Availability of other good resources.

Support from Andy Barker and others to make our use of the internet possible and successful.

We cooperate to a lesser degree on two other course, US Hst. and 9th grade; the work in all three courses enriches the other.

Hindered:

Teaching the course in the spring term to seniors is both a challenge and an opportunity. We must teach in ways that are genuinely engaging to the students, which is good, but a steady string of absences for sports, trips, etc. is a major detraction and frustration.