Tlami- How can we help Mexican High Schools offer a quality education to every single student?
The Global Goals are seventeen ways of making the world more sustainable, and knowing that there is a project called Global Goals Jam where you as a regular citizen can reunite in groups and discuss about a remarkable solution that will help solve these problems in a long-term plan we thought it was an opportunity we could not miss. We believed it was a once in a lifetime experience where you could actually put your creativity to fly and we could help others by thinking of crazy and affordable solutions that will eventually help our country get better, but overall this prepositions can help the world and people in it, create and make a decent world to leave in for all the people, not depending on where they live or how they are. We decide to join Global Goals Jam because we are consent of the world where we are living at and the problems that surround it and we saw this as the perfect opportunity to actually do something that could change it.
We worked on the first Global Goal established by the United Nations, which is no poverty. The challenge that we decided to take to accomplish this Global Goal is, how can we improve the development of learning and cognitive skills in high school education of low-income groups? The Mexican students that have to belong to the low-income family do not have the same opportunities as the other young people that have access to a great education and that develop their mentality and education in a good way. According to OECD Mexico is the number 30 of 30 countries that take place in this organization in high school education, this means that the Mexican program at this level of education does not help all the young people to find a meaning to education and they quit or simply do not feel attracted to have more knowledge and become better people. This also happens because in Mexico, as a country, it is really hard to change of social class, almost impossible, and most of the people know that if they were born poor they will stay like that and education will not help them get the life they are willing for, so they see no point on it and start working at a really early age to bring food home.
In México high school is an obligatory phase to study for all the citizens, but this does not assure that all of them go or that all of them who actually go get a quality education. That is why Disruptive that was the host organization for this program in Mexico City decided that they wanted us to help them get a solution for this problem that affects a lot of people between the ages 15 and 18 that are supposed to be studying to afford to have a better life in the future. We also are consent that education is an effective tool that can help a lot of people to become better an to get out of the system of poverty and misery that surrounds them. Education opens their mind and helps them see the world through different eyes as it also helps them become who they want to be, education perfectionates the human being and we agree that it is one of the principal tools that is applicable all over the world and that will efficiently help eradicate the poverty in all the places around the world.
Agreeing in one effective way of fighting this problem was really hard, at first we made this graphic where we discussed the people involved in the challenge we decide to take part in, and decided that the principal ones involved are the students, the second more important ones are the families of this students and the high school teachers all over Mexico City; and the last and third people involved in this problem are the Mexican government, non profit education organizations, and schools. After we had agreed in all the people that can take part in this problem we started looking for accurate information that could help us understand the problem and the needs that these people have, and how we could take action to find a solution for this issue where we decided that the most important thing that these students need is motivation to continue studying and a purpose to stay in school and keep getting educated. This day we decided that a way of keeping them motivated and interested in their studies was helping them see what education can actually do and how far they can get if they are willing to and compromise to work to achieve that. Most of them will have to find a job to continue their studies so we thought that motivating them through a work-related activity would them know what they can do in a business or that they can get money fulfilling their dreams even if it is painting, as a salesman, as a politician, musician, etc., and that education is the way to get to achieve all of this goals.
The second day we decided to improve the idea, especially because when we made it we did not think about how we were going to make money and afford the project so we could implement it at low-income high schools, so we came with a different idea still involving motivating the students by showing them what or who they can be when they grow up but now not only considering low-income high school but all the high schools in México City so they have the same opportunities and feel capable of accomplishing whatever they dream of, it does not matter what it is. We decided that it would be a good idea to sell this program to private schools and with that money improve the program and implement it also in public schools. So our idea is to create a simulated business environment inside the school where the students can pretend to work in what they like and the position they want to take inside it, to create a space where they know what work is like and what they can do with their capacities as well as develop new ones that will help them in their daily life.
To communicate our idea we made peach were we talked about high school Mexican education statistics in the begging to create consciousness in the public and then we talk about our project called “Tlami” which is a Nahuatl word that means ending because we want to help young people to end their studies motivated and knowing this will help them become a better citizen of the world. The people expert in sustainability told us that they really like our project and the creativeness we show to fight this problem, but that we should explain more how is it that we are going to accomplish this project and actually take it into real schools. So we decided to add that information into our final presentation and peach to make it more clear and real for Mexican society.
This Global Goal Jam project really helped us develop new capacities such as working with different people to accomplish one goal and especially with people with different studies that help you see the problem from another view and with a change in the perspective. We also learned that it is really hard to create a solution that will impact every single person and that is sustainable by itself, also to create all the process you will have to follow was challenger because structure is hard when you do not actually know the people you are building this solution for and you do not know if schools will like to implement this. But now we know that this idea will help the students and the school in a positive way, so there is no reason to say no.
We as citizens of the world are conscious of all the problems that surround us and we know that is our responsibility to make a change to improve the quality of life. Our way of stepping in and find a solution to this issues was assisting to the Global Goals Jam and creating the “Tlami” project, with the objective of improving the quality of education in Mexicans high schools and helping these age students find the meaning of education fulfilling this way the goal that eradicates poverty. We really want to create something special that will improve the way people live in our country, so we want to invite you to be part of this team and help us make “Tlami” something possible and affordable to make this world a more sustainable place where everyone has the same opportunities and is able to accomplish their dreams.
In case you want to join this cause you can contact either Jesica to the mail 0191205@up.edu.mx or Gisela to the mail 0192730@up.edu.mx and we will be happy to have you in Tlami to make México a better place for high school students.
