Bjorkskatanskola

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Time to talk about my volunteering, since it is a rather big part of what I end up doing here most of the time. Okay so-across the street from where I live is the school. It's a middle school, which means it comes before Gymnasium, which is Swedish High School. I basically go into the English classes and help kids, speak with them, have discussions with them, and let them hear what a native speaker sounds like. The teachers are nice and the Headmistress there is too. Her name is Berit. There's also a male Headmaster and they are the school's rektors (Swedish for rector). So, the kids generally dress like punks. Think Good Charlotte without the piercings and you have it. If I had a dime for how many hoodies, Vans, Pumas, baggy pants, and stuff I've seen, I'd be rich. Some of them are good kids, but in general the attitude is more lax.

I've spoken with the teachers and they don't have any power really. Discipline is very lacking. The situation is this: parents believe their kids, not the teachers. So the teachers can't really enforce anything since the parents won't support them and punish the kids. Kids talk in class, try to skip in line at lunch, and call the teachers by their first names. I also don't think they even know what expulsion is here. Either way, the kids don't really do their work in class. They goof off. They're trying to start a private school in Lulea-the first of its kind here-but some aren't very hopeful about it. The school has a hockey rink. They also have better food to eat in the cafeteria than we do.

I went walking one night in the snow on the bike path and I came across some of my kids. One of them was drunk. A 14 year old kid, drunk! *sigh* And it was late at night too and here they were out doing whatever. Johan says this is a problem. The kids have nothing to do so they wander around late at night and their parents don't care. They also break into the apartment buildings and vandalize things. At Vaderleden, they had someone write choice words in yellow spray paint. Here, we had someone get ahold of chocolate powder and spread it everywhere. I'm glad Johan cleaned it up before I saw it.. Then, we had food go missing so the doors started getting locked. Let them try and steal my Haagen Daz again!

Now, we had a little intro bit where I told them my name and some stuff about me, then they were allowed to ask questions. Alot of them asked me about what I thought of Bush. It seems all over the world, no one likes him. Good thing I'm in agreement. So then, they asked about what I liked to eat, what movies I liked, and stuff like that. I made them laugh, so that was good too.

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