Poverty in Other Countries

Since I have been unsuccessful at reaching my contacts, I chose to do the alternate assignment for this week's blog.

TJ Skalski

TJ Skalski is Principal of The Mother Earth’s Children’s Charter School (MECCS), the first Indigenous charter school in Canada. Originally from the Blood Reserve and raised in southern Alberta, she eventually left to complete her education, including a Masters of Education degree.

Surrounded by Mother Nature, MECCS recently moved from Wabamun into the former Saint John’s School of Alberta located 35 minutes southwest of Stony Plain, AB on the banks of the North Saskatchewan River near Genessee. A Program Showcase on MECCS can be found in the January/February 2010 issue of Exchange.

For additional information, go to meccs.org.

Personal Thoughts:

TJ Skalski, who is the principal of the Mother Earth Children's Charter  School in Canada, took some time to explain her role in the child education  and development field.  She spoke about her up-bringing, and how she had  the support of her mom and grandma.  TJ Skalski spoke about how her mom  and grandma were heavily involved with her life, promoting her and teaching  her that she can be and do what she desires. She spoke about "reinvesting in  the our children"  and revitalizing their communities.  TJ Skalski chose to make  a difference by doing her job, because she wants to build dreams, inspire hope,  and teach the children that they can be and do whatever they desire to with the  proper work ethics and determination. China's Poverty: China "The world's most populous country with a population of 1.27 billion in 20011 ,  China has made major strides in poverty reduction in recent years. By 2001  5 per cent of China's population lived below the national poverty line.2  Rural  poverty is estimated to have fallen from 250 million in 1978 to 35 million in 2000  and from 30.7 per cent of the population to 3.7 per cent according to official statistics. 3 Between 4 and 8 per cent of the urban population, somewhere between 15  and 31 million people live in poverty.4 Much of this decline in poverty is due to  far-reaching processes of economic and social transition  However, economic  growth has been slower in Western China, leading to higher poverty rates.  For example, in 1988, a person in the West was 3 times as likely as their  Eastern counterpart to be poor; by 1998, they were 6 times more likely to be  poor.5 This figure shows the enormous rise in inequality in China in recent years  - from one of the most equal societies in the world to one of the most unequal.6  Furthermore, the national poverty line is low by international standards, meaning  that many more people live close to poverty.  China's transition from a centrally  planned to a globalised market economy has helped reduce chronic poverty and  disadvantage, but also created new forms of vulnerability and poverty. Eastern China, in particular, has clearly benefited from controlled liberalisation, and carefully  used foreign investment - China receives more foreign investment than any other  country in the world except for the US.7  At the same time, throughout the country,  adapting to the market and preparing for joining the World Trade Organisation in  2001, has had enormous implications for employment and well-being.  One critical  area of reform is the ongoing restructuring of state-owned enterprises. In 1995-2000,  the state sector lost 31 million jobs. Not enough new jobs in the non-state sector  have yet been created and an estimated 14.6 million are without a full-time job - an  unemployment rate of 12.3 per cent.8   In addition to this, inflation in the early 1990s  and the introduction of charges for health and education services increased pressures  on many households. Liberalisation has also led to massive migration, as over 120  million people have moved to the cities since 1990, in search of better opportunities. Childhood poverty 4.2 million Chinese children live in absolute poverty and 8.7 million live in  disadvantaged conditions.9  Both the absolute numbers and proportion of  children living in poverty have declined over the 1990s. Education and health  levels in China are higher than in many countries with equivalent incomes  -  life expectancy at birth is 71 years, and 85 per cent of the population aged  over 15 are literate. However, improvements in these areas have slowed down  over the 1990s and there are major regional differences. For example, in 1999  the national child mortality rate was 32 per thousand but 47.9 in the West.10   While 80 per cent of Western Chinese children complete primary school, this  is 9 per cent fewer than the national average and 15 per cent fewer than in  Eastern China. Recent studies suggest that the health and education reforms  are reducing poor families' ability to make use of these vital services. For  example, one study in Beijing, China's richest city, found that 75 of poor  families could not afford all children's education costs such as tuition fees  and stationery costs, while 50 per cent of poor families in Shanghai had no  medical insurance because they could not afford it.1"  Below is an active case study for a poor migrant family in China Case Study - Nan Nan China Fourteen-year-old Nan Nan moved to Hefei, the capital of China’s Anhui province,  a year ago. She used to live and go to school in a rural part of Anhui, and is finding \ life in her new school difficult: “I do not like studying at the school in Hefei, I have  no friends here, all my friends are now in Shucheng.  I am regarded as a rural farmer  child.  My schoolmates always laugh at me because of my rural accent.  I am two  years older than the kids in my class, who say I must be stupid because I cannot go  into a higher grade with kids my own age. The teachers do not care much about me.   I always wish I could go back to Shucheng, but my mum and dad told me that if I  study at the school in Hefei, I will receive better teaching and get good grades, and  that I can then have a better life in the future.” Nan Nan used to live in Shucheng, on a rural farm four hours away by train from Hefei.  Her parents migrated to Hefei six years ago.  Her father found a job on a construction  site, and her mother became a roadside fruit vendor.  When Nan Nan’s parents migrated  to Hefei, they left Nan Nan and her brother with their grandparents in Shucheng. Two  years later, Nan Nan’s parents took her brother with them to Hefei, while she stayed on  with her grand parents in the village: “I prefer living with my grandparents in the village.  My parents used to come back every year for a couple of days during Chun Jie (the  Chinese New Year), but they did not have much time to check my schoolwork, and  just used to give me some money when they came back to visit me.  My grandparents  were very nice to me, they never swore at me if I did not get good grades at school,  and I could play with my friends for as long as I wanted.”  Nan Nan has very fond  memories of life in the village. A year ago her parents decided that she too should  join them in Hefei, so Nan Nan moved to the city and to a new school. Talking about the family’s decision to leave Shucheng, Nan Nan’s mother says that  life on the farm was becoming too difficult for her family.  She recalls that they used  to get a very poor harvest every year, earning only 200 RMB1 from every mu2 of their  harvest – that is, 200 RMB gross, without deducting the cost of seeds and chemical  fertilizers. She says they decided to move to Hefei because of the better income-earning  opportunities available there: her husband now earns 800 RMB per month, and she earns  400 RMB. Despite their higher incomes, Nan Nan’s parents still find that life in Hefei is  financially tight. They pay 200 RMB a month to rent their small flat, and since Nan Nan   does not have a Hefei Hukou (a residential permit for Hefei), they are also obliged to pay  a ‘sponsorship fee’ to her school on top of the tuition fees. The family used up all their  savings to buy a Hukou for Nan Nan’s brother, and cannot afford to buy one for Nan Nan too. Life in Hefei has other disadvantages, too. It is not only Nan Nan who has trouble getting along  with people in the city – Nan Nan’s mother has also experienced similar problems: “We do not  have any city friends in Hefei, our friends are rural people like us. We sometimes try to make  friends with city people, but we always feel they are condescending. And people in charge of  the city administration are so tough on us – they take away our vending stall, and charge us a  fee to get our fruit back.” Nan Nan’s father has to stay on the construction site where he works, and he can only visit the  family once a month. Nan Nan lives with her mother and brother in a small, damp and dimly lit  rented flat, which is only about 10 square meters. As there is no toilet in the flat, the family has  to go to the public toilet. The family’s most expensive possession is a television set. Nan Nan’s  mother gets up at 6 o’clock every morning and goes to the wholesale market to buy fruit,  which she then sells on the street.  Nan Nan gets up together with her mother, makes  breakfast for her brother and herself, and then goes to school. Nan Nan’s mother gives her  and her brother 3 RMB every day for buying lunch. Nan Nan cooks the evening meal, as her  mother comes home late, usually around 8 o’clock.  Nan Nan’s mother does not like the fact  that she comes home too late to help her children with their homework in the evening: “Our main  purpose in migrating to Hefei was to make a better life for our children. However, now I am so busy,  I don’t even have time to spend with them, to check how they are doing at school. I sometimes  wonder why we came." Personal Thoughts about the Case Study:  This story listed above is about a migrant family who was from China.    The migrant family moved to find a better life and education for their children.  The children explain how they miss home, friends and family.  The children  explained how they felt like the teacher's did not care about them and how  the other children discriminated against them. After reading about this family,  It was quite apparent that the children who endure poverty as children, have a  higher chance of experiencing adverse affects from poverty throughout life.  In  conclusion, the families overall feeling about the move, which in the beginning  was for better opportunities was in question, and the parents felt that life was  a toss up between education and little to no free time to be a real family in their  new world experience.