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Even though she was half a world away, the Olympia resident paid close attention to developments in the deadly Soweto uprising – the most brutal riots that took place against the South African apartheid administration.
So when Nickerson recently walked into the Regina Mundi Church in Johannesburg, where police officers opened fire on young protesters nearly 35 years ago, the 51-year-old couldn’t help but weep.
“That’s when it hit me,” she said. “I got so emotional.”
Nickerson, a librarian at Black Hills High School in Tumwater, spent 21/2 weeks this summer visiting schools, historical sites and environmental projects in South Africa as part of the Toyota International Teacher Program.
During their travels, the educators spent time in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban, Cape Town and Kruger National Park.
For Nickerson, one of the highlights was visiting a Soweto neighborhood that featured homes of Nelson Mandela and Bishop Desmond Tutu.
“It’s the only street in the world that has two Nobel Peace Prize winners,” she said.
Nickerson was one of 24 educators chosen out of more than 1,000 applicants for the all-expenses-paid trip funded by Toyota Motor Sales. The program is administered by the Institute of International Education; its goal is to enhance environmental and global awareness in schools, organizers say.
“It is our hope that this group of teachers will continue to collaborate with the local South African educators after the program, helping diversify classroom curriculum in the United States,” Dr. Allan Goodman, president and chief executive officer of the Institute of International Education, said in a news release.
During the trip, Nickerson was inspired to begin collecting easy-to-read nonfiction books to send to one of the teachers in South Africa she met through the program. The teacher voluntarily staffs a library that’s open to students only after school hours.
“Only 8 percent of their schools have libraries,” Nickerson said, noting that many of the libraries were shuttered due to budget cuts.
While some schools get a visit from a mobile library about once a month, many of the materials haven’t been relevant since the 1970s, Nickerson said.
The trip gave her a greater appreciation of the resources and support in American schools, she said. In South Africa, most elementary and middle school teachers have 60 to 80 students in their classrooms. HIV, AIDS and tuberculosis run rampant in the country, and South Africa has a high dropout and crime rate.
And yet, there was an incredible sense of forgiveness and optimism among the people in South Africa, Nickerson said.
“I saw so much hope in people’s faces,” she said. “No matter who they were, they lived in this country and they had a strong sense of hope for their future.”
As part of her tour, Nickerson visited a community garden project that was feeding hungry people, and toured a facility that was producing energy from a landfill’s methane gases.
“I think it instilled in me that it really is those small, grass-roots projects that make a difference,” Nickerson said.
In addition to collecting books for schoolchildren in South Africa, Nickerson is putting together a slide show to share with her school’s students about South Africa’s environmental issues, education and history.
She also plans to put together a presentation on the country’s birds and wildlife to share with her Audubon Society chapter.
Lisa Pemberton: 360-754-5433
lpemberton@theolympian.com
