Bridge year « Birth of a Movement: Entreprenuers Striving to Change the World

A Quiet, Thoughtful Afternoon in Mexico

by RitaGoldenGelman

So everyone (my son, Mitch, his wife, Melissa, and five-year-old Cris went off for the afternoon to La Paz, about an hour from here (Todos Santos). I opted to stay home where the quiet is wonderful. F0r the last hour I’ve been reading articles on The Gap Year, some from the US, some from England. I’m hoping to link to a whole bunch of them on the Let’s Get Global website (the one that I’m still working on). It doesn’t make sense for me to restate what has many times been so eloquently and passionately expressed.

I may take a couple of sentences from each article and then put in the link.

The hardest arguments to present are the ones that are based on statistics. There really are none. Oh, there’s the one that says young people who do a gap year are more likely to stay in college and graduate. And there’s the one often cited that 30% of college students drop out. Others say between 20 and 30%. And some go lower and some higher. In making an argument for funding, statistics are crucial. And no one has statistics, even about how many gappers there are. It’s kind of sticky to quote statistics if there are none that are official.

Last night over dinner, Mitch suggested, Think big, start small. I’m thinking he’s right. Maybe Let’s Get Global should start with, say twelve schools from different segments of the population and diverse geographical locations. Together we could create and initiate a plan, tweak it for the different populations, but basically keep it the same. After a few years we will have statistics of our own that we can present to a lot more schools around the country. And each year we could expand the number of schools involved.

I’d love comments and perhaps some suggestions of schools that you think would be good test communities. We’d like to take the test across economic, racial, urban, rural boundaries so we can come up with a strong picture of what happens when we bring our ideas into different areas. Our campaign in each community would be designed to include guidance counselors, student clubs, events, local fundraising ideas (for scholarships), and fundraising projects for the students, etc.

Would any of you reading this like to get involved in making this happen in a school in your community? It would be pretty exciting to be a part of the initial twelve. Please write to me at: info@letsgetglobal.org And feel free to comment here as well. Thanks, Rita

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Rita Golden Gelman: MAY I HAVE YOUR ORDER, PLEASE

by RitaGoldenGelman

So everything was going great. I was researching foundations, writing a query letter to them explaining who we are, and making a list of things to do before I left at five to meet some unmet friends for dinner about an hour away. I was struggling with the letter….it all had to be right. The organization of the information, the words, the facts. The only thing in the whole world that I am a perfectionist about is my writing. For those of you who think writing is easy for writers, you might enjoy this quote from Thomas Mann. He speaks for all of us: “A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.”

But I was doing it and the words were piling up nicely.

Then it was time to go. I left early because I’d never been to the town in Maryland where we were meeting. The drive wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been and I was happily listening to NPR in the almost rush hour traffic. Then, after I’d been on the road for forty-five minutes, the guy on the radio said something about “the weather on this fifth day of October …” No! Our dinner was on the sixth!” I got off the 495 highway going north and got back on going south.

I’d been thinking all the way about pupusas…a national dish in El Salvador that they served at the restaurant . Now I wasn’t going to have them. So I got to thinking about national dishes and suddenly I wanted, needed, craved a Big Mac. Yes, I couldn’t wait to bite into a Big Mac. I get that urge about once a year. This was my Big Mac day. I smiled in anticipation; but I had no idea where I would find a McDonalds. I decided that I would take my chances and hope that those yellow arches would appear. I couldn’t remember any along the way, but I stuck to the route home. Then, miraculously and by mistake, I turned the wrong way on South Van Dorn and there they were, inviting me to have my Big Mac. I got into a long line of cars, two of which were strangely trying to back out of the Drive-In order line.

I ordered my Big Mac and the voice in the machine informed me that they had no meat. I thought I didn’t hear right. I ordered again. No meat. No hamburgers. No Big Macs. But I was in a McDonalds. There had to be meat. That’s the definition of McDonalds. “We have no meat,” she said for the third time.

Now once upon a time I was in a vegetarian McDonalds in India….but this was Alexandria, Virginia. No meat really meant no meat. Apparently the truck with the meat never arrived. I ordered six chicken nuggets and a small French fries and drove back to the house where I am house-sitting. Not a good day!!!

Tomorrow it will be pupusas…and the good news is that I know how to get there.

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Rita Golden Gelman: Keeping the Dream Alive: Let’s Get Global

by admin

For those of you who are not aware that papers multiply spontaneously, I have two things to say. First, I hate you for not experiencing this evil phenomenon. And second, how I wish I knew your secret. The papers in my life expand exponentially. As I write this, I can feel and hear them reproducing themselves like millions of lymphocyte cells endlessly and relentlessly reproducing themselves.

I am very much aware that you who are immune are part of a conspiracy to keep those of us who are plagued by this environmental disease from escaping its clutches. Oh, you give us lectures and lessons and you tell us about numbering pages, using organizational software, buying special notebooks and files and sticky pads and sticky labels. So we rush out and buy the equipment…but it never works. Many of us have brief moments when the disease is in remission, but always it flares up again, like herpes or malaria.

Those of us afflicted need those of you who are immune. At the moment I have three of you who are trying to help. I really don’t hate you; I need you. Liz, Hope, and DeeNice. I do appreciate your efforts, don’t stop trying, but I confess that I’m secretly afraid you will all abandon me when your frustration peaks, and then I will be left alone with a growing pile of disaffiliated papers, notebooks, recycled sheets and napkins and sales slips with scribbles on them. Surely it is a genetic thing. Just a few more generations and the fittest will survive and the piles of papers will disappear. But meanwhile, don’t go away. I need you.

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Rita Golden Gelman: Let’s Get Global: My Passion

by admin

Well, I’m not climbing mountains in the jungles of New Guinea at the moment, and most of the people I meet have clothes on, and here in DC I don’t see a lot of saris or sarongs—but launching “Let’s Get Global” is definitely an adventure. I’m in uncharted waters and it’s both frustrating and exhilarating.

I love the passion I’m feeling. I am absolutely determined to change the country, to convince people that it’s important to have a global population if we want to be leaders in today’s world. I mean, we can’t keep our young people inside the United States and expect world leaders to emerge.

Education—for everyone—has to continue beyond our borders. International experiences develop independent thinking, challenging situations develop values and self-confidence, and intercultural interaction inevitably yields respect and understanding………..and leaders.

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Rita Golden Gelman: I Like DC

by admin

I like DC.

I chose to settle into Washington because I felt there were organizations, colleges, movers and shakers that would be important contacts to have while creating a national movement. DC just felt right. As an outsider, I’m seeing the city with the eyes of a newcomer. It’s overwhelming. When I arrived at the end of August, I moved into a beautiful, quiet neighborhood.

Rita Golden Gelman stay in Washington DC for Let's Go Global

Nearly empty sidewalks with strolling moms, young people casually dressed, dog walkers. Lots of jeans, shorts, tank tops, flip flops. I chose to rent a place in the middle of the action. If I walk just three blocks north from my apartment house, I pass the Library of Congress, the Supreme Court, and the Capitol. Quiet and elegant.
Then a week or so ago, Congress returned from summer vacation. My neighborhood is suddenly filled with suits and ties and high heels, all carrying briefcases or small backpacks. There are lots of suits and heels in my building too. Apparently there are tons of congressional people who have their small city apartments in my buildings. You sort of know the ones in elected office because they smile and say things like, “How are you doing?” There’s a gym room in the building. Apparently that’s where people meet. When I move back in on October 12th, I’m going to begin an exercise routine. Gotta be good for Let’s Get Global as well as my body.

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Rita Golden Gelman: Let’s Get Global is Born

by admin

I’ve always wanted to be a hero. When I was a teenager, I was a lifeguard. I used to have fantasies of saving lives…but no one ever needed saving on my watch. I used to have dreams of going into burning buildings and rescuing children. But I never did. Suddenly, I knew I had to do something. I was seventy one. It wasn’t too late. But it had to be a fit.

Before the month was over I decided to work at changing the mentality in the U.S. I would create a movement that would encourage our kids to take a gap year, between high school and the next phase of their lives. Let them discover the world. Let them learn that we are indeed all the same…the tribal people in New Guinea and the tango dancers in Argentina, the farmers in Mexico and the royalty in Bali, the sheep herders in New Zealand and the goat herders in Tanzania. These were things that our population needed to know.

In my travels I had met tons of young people from England, New Zealand, Australia, Israel, and many other countries, who were maturing themselves while discovering the world. They were doing their Gap Year, Bridge Year, Overseas Experience. It’s a concept that has never taken root in the U. S. We’re a country that doesn’t trust foreigners, a country that is geographically isolated. Ignorance breeds intolerance. If we are going to be leaders in the world, our population has to cross borders, share meals, laugh, work, and play in other countries. And share and learn about other ways of being. Let’ Get Global is determined to open up the world to our high sch0ol graduates. We will have a very different country when the majority of our population has experienced an international “GapYear.”

That’s when Let’s Get Global was born. Except I called it Global Learning.

The idea was born in December. I left for Spain at the end of January on a planned mini-adventure.

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