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July 15, 2005
Indigenous University?
I was in Puyo in the Amazon from Wed to Friday last week, learning about and supporting various processes for UNIDAE, The University Of Indigenous Nationalities of The Ecuadorian Amazon, which is the only indigenous-run university in the region. It offers degrees in Environmental Management and Tourism, Community Health, and Business Administration, and offers classes in many topics including English, Math, Stats, Indigenous Technology (along with modern technology, science, business, and law), Natural Science, Biology, Anthropology, Sociology, Bilingual Languages, and Indigenous Philosophy. I took a tour of the campus, helped out in a class about ecologically-sound agricultural management, did some office work, and even taught an English class on Friday when the professor didn’t show up. An English lesson was not a problem for me to improvise on the spot, since I volunteer teaching English to Guatemalan immigrants once or twice a week at Brown.
Students working on projects in their agroecology class
The university was started in 1997 by CONFENIAE, the largest indigenous political organization of the Ecuadorian Amazon. UNIDAE now has an enrollment of nearly 150 students, though because of changes in course dates, only 35 were present for the week of courses at which I was present. The university seeks to provide an educational alternative and learning facility for both indigenous and mestizo students.
Lee teaching English to his student and giving the "thumbs up" for good work (I didn't even know I was doing that!)
UNIDAE was forcibly shut down for nearly two years by the Ecuadorian government, who demanded that it needed to get legal recognition for its degrees before it could reopen. Recently, UNIDAE gained this needed approval and recognition for its bachelor’s program from the University of Cuenca. UNIDAE’s curriculum further gained official recognition from the Council of Universities of Ecuador. These developments represent a huge victory for the university in its struggle to gain legitimacy and provide an indigenous-led alternative form of higher education. The courses I attended were the first given since this pause in instruction.
Students designing a historical map of the organization of their communities for their Participatory Work class
UNIDAE, sadly, has a lot of problems. It is severely under-funded, and Pachamama, a small NGO, currently provides nearly half the funding. The director (only in place the last 3 months) is suspected of stealing money, and his undersecretary recently, and mysteriously, acquired the funds to construct quite a large house in Puyo. The university is in possession of few educational materials and has a very limited library. Indeed, the ecological territorial management class I helped facilitate one day had to use plastic soda bottles and cups instead of beakers with proper measures. In addition, the students have to pay nearly $100 per term (classes meets for one entire week every month), a ridiculously exorbitant amount for the mostly-indigenous student body who, on average, have very low incomes. Many are in massive debt without the possibilities of gaining income soon because, shit, they live most of the time in the middle of the forest and are working towards or have only recently received their university degree. Finally, absenteeism among teachers is a constant plague. Indeed, the university has such numerous and important problems that they place the future existence and success of the university in jeopardy.
First-year Students engaging in group work for their Economics class.
I talked with many people, including students, directors and teachers, about these problems, and Cristina and I have begun a Pachamama discussion about these issues. In fact, two days ago Cristina decided that the problems were so massive that Pachamama cannot be certain that their funds will be well-spent. Thus, we have planned to revoke our agreed partnership with and support of UNIDAE in two weeks for a period of at least three months, until UNIDAE can prove that it has its house in order.
Yet we should not lose hope. UNIDAE is not yet a lost cause. It is still salvageable because of the students themselves. I observed fun, attentive, eager 30-50 year old men and women who are driven to learn. These students see education as a tool for power, as well as an aid to the achievement of future goals, whether they be improvements in economic and material well-being, the acquisition of knowledge for knowledge’s sake, skills to implement in their communities to improve basic services, or tools to help them in the struggle of indigenous peoples’ to defend their territories and cultures and assert autonomous forms of economic development and political governance. These students present a vision of hope and possibility for the future of the university.
You can read a bit more about UNIDAE here
Posted by Lee Gilman at July 15, 2005 12:33 PM
