Background for Mary Semoisi

My name is Maloase Mary Semoisi. I’m the third child of my parents.

I have finished my primary at Are-fenyeng Primary School and I moved to secondary at Mmokeng Secondary School and I matriculate in 2009. After my matric life was very hard. I had goals and we did not have the money for me to take the next step and further my education. I had nothing to do for three years; I struggled to look for ways to help out but could not find any. I was really hoping to study in the medical field at the University in Joburg but I understood and accepted the life I had.

LEARNING ABOUT WDMCC

While in school in 2006 there were some visitors from U.S who brought the learners some books for the library. One day my brother, White, told me that the Americans we met those many years ago were going to open a college right here in Kanana. I knew that this was the chance I was looking for to further my studies. I made a decision about my career; I would study Emergency Management at this new college called World Disaster Management Community College. I would have never though that the American visitors I met so long ago could play such a big role in my life.

THE FIRST SEMESTER

The opening day for the school was on 10 September 2012. We were expecting our leaders from U.S to open the school with the launch as they promised, but we only opened with Dr. Zodwa Dlamini and her father. I now understand that they will have the big launch at the start of our second year in September 2013, I am looking forward to that. The second day of class we continue by ourselves and received the lesson from our teacher though email. We struggled because we were used to having a teacher in front of us. Online learning was going to be different; we had to do things on our own. Everyone was happy and excited about starting the school after being unemployed and not having money for their dream careers. But it looked like this would not be as easy as we one thought.

LOW LIGHTS

Having the lessons sent through email and having to then take online exams was a lot to take in. Completing our first course  ‘Introduction in Emergency Management’ was difficult because we would all meet as a class to talk about a subject, a few learners would read the lesson on a topic which none of us really knew anything about. It was such a different way to learn. It was a lot like learning in the dark, we struggled to learn in the darkness but it was when we saw a light that we came out of our darkness.

This light that I speak of was the arrival of Mr. Landon Densley. He came all the way from the U.S. to help lecture and discuss the remaining lessons. Even thought it was very hard to understand the different American accent we were so happy to have such a knowledgeable teacher with us and after a few days we started to really understand him.

HIGHLIGHTS

Learning about emergency planning was a highlight for me. We ended our planning lessons by creating our own family plans. This was such a highlight for the first semester. Then we expanded our planning lesson by meeting with the Kanana Secondary School principal. She asked us to write a school emergency operations plan (EOP) for them. Our first meeting we invited all Kanana school principals, police, fire department, CSS (security), disaster management, and more. It was so exciting to create a real plan for such a large school and to get so many people involved in the planning process.

Mr. Craig Carty delivered a few computers for us which were so helpful. We were able to get them working and connected to the internet just as FEMA gave us our student numbers so we could take online exams. And to top off our first semester Mr. Landon told us that he would stay for part of the second semester. We did not expect that and it was so great, it really gave us a boost to help us feel our school could be a success.

SECOND SEMESTER

Everything is wonderful since we start the second semester; we are all so full of energy. We started this blog, it is so interesting. Everyone can now see how committed we are for the success of this school. We are still continuing with emergency plan for Kanana Secondary School. And we are even learning about Fire safety from the local fire department teachers. Thank you, thank you Fire Chief for giving us our great teachers for these lessons.