The Inside Story - The Price of Learning | Episode 108 TRANSCRIPT

Transcript:

The Inside Story: The Price of Education

Episode 108 – September 7, 2023

Show Open:

This week on The Inside Story... The Price of Learning.

A humanitarian crisis grips Sudan as yet another unfolds in Ukraine.

Meanwhile, it's back-to-school season for much of the Northern Hemisphere.

What does it cost to get an education? And is it even worth it?

Now on The Inside Story... The Price of Learning.

The Inside Story:

ELIZBETH LEE, VOA Correspondent:

Welcome to the Inside Story. I’m Elizabeth Lee in Washington, on the campus of George Washington University, just a few blocks from the White House.

More than nine hundred thousand students from around the globe come to the United States each year to pursue college degrees, overcoming challenges ranging from high costs to restrictive visas.

They often leave behind unimaginable hardships as they study far from home.

However, returning home is where many students intend to put their American diplomas to work, hoping that what they learned here will help them improve the lives of their families and fellow countrymen. As the school year begins in the United States, we will explore the value of an American college degree.

According to Forbes, as of 2021, more than half of Americans aged 25 to 64 possess some form of higher education, whether that is through a university degree or industry-recognized certifications. However, for foreign students who are interested in studying in the US, the pursuit of knowledge may appear intimidating even before it commences.

However, for foreign students who are interested in studying in the US, the pursuit of knowledge may appear intimidating, even before it starts. We spoke with Carol Kim, Vice President for Global recruitment, admissions and financial aid at New York University, which is one of the most popular destinations for international students.

Carol Kim, Vice President for Global recruitment, New York University:

I think families should really sit down and say what is important? What is the importance for us as a family and for the student who was actually looking? What are they looking for in their college experience?

And so a US college experience offers things that are very different than a college experience elsewhere. And I say that because here is also a place where you can come and be undecided.

Undecided doesn't exist in any other part of the world. And so someone who actually has turned 17 or 18 or 19 years older and a young adult, and they're not really sure what they want to do yet, in most other parts of the world, you have to decide, and that's what you're going to study. And that is what your path is set on. This is a place that we actually recognize that your frontal cortex is not quite formed yet.

Your brain is still developing. You're still trying to figure out who you are as a person and that we do not have students declare their major from the beginning you can if you would like. You can decide if you are very decided on the fact that you want to be a filmmaker, you would like to be an engineer, you want to come and start from the very beginning to the neuroscientists. I mean, you can do all those things, but you can also come to college anywhere in the US and be undecided, and explore, and I think curiosity and exploration is something that maybe in US higher education really support, as well as we think it's an important part of a student's discovery.

And so it's something that is different than other parts of the world. And if added is something that is exciting for family to see. And to experience. I think it would be great. This would be a great place for them to come to.

ELIZBETH LEE, VOA Correspondent:

More than 90 percent of American school children study in the public school system. However, it's important to note that this number includes a variety of factors. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, approximately 59 percent of children in the United States aged five and younger, who are not enrolled in kindergarten, have experienced some form of early childhood education, commonly known as daycare.

This early education serves as the initial stepping stone for many children, setting them on their paths towards elementary, high school, and ultimately, higher education. VOA's Arash Arabasadi conducted interviews with three experts who play a crucial role in shaping how children learn today, with the aim of preparing them for higher education.

ELIZBETH LEE:

During the war in Ukraine, thousands of schools have been damaged and hundreds have been completely destroyed. As a result, students living near the battle zones are facing significant challenges in accessing education.

Heather Murdock reports with Yevhenii Shynkar in Lyman, Ukraine. It is important to note that this report contains graphic images that may be unsettling to some viewers.

HEATHER MURDOCK, VOA Correspondent:

Every school in the city of Lyman, Ukraine has been damaged and many are destroyed.

This school was hit before the city was captured by Russia in May 2022, and it has remained shut down since Ukraine took the city back four months later.

Zakhar, 9^th Grade Student:

Over here we ran long and short distances [for gym class]. Here we played football. On the second floor was a cafeteria. On the first floor was an assembly room.

Maxim, 9^th Grade Student:

We had assemblies there.

Zakhar, 9^th Grade Student:

In the basement we had industrial arts and health classes.

HEATHER MURDOCK:

Now, as the battles once again approach Lyman, with an attack killing eight civilians in early July, students say they are facing yet another year of the online education that

began with pandemic lockdowns. Local leaders say volunteers provide some supplies and internet links.

Nadiya Didenko, Lyman City Council:

They are not enough, but they provided us with laptops, tablets, printers and stationery items, but it was very, very difficult.

HEATHER MURDOCK, VOA Correspondent:

But students say supplies are useless when battles draw near, as the internet is down, or only available in hospitals or military bases. The Ukrainian government says thousands of schools have been damaged in the war and hundreds are destroyed.

Studying online under these conditions is better than no education at all, but just barely, says Zakhar.

Zakhar, Lyman 9th Grade Student:

I'd rather study at school than on the phone online. On the phone, sometimes the topics are not even clear. At school they will explain everything to you, show you, and you write things down, go to the blackboard, answer questions.

HEATHER MURDOCK, VOA Correspondent:

Other students tell us they are forgetting more from their in-person school days than they are currently learning.

In Lyman, there are just over 500 children struggling to get an education, as most families have long fled the area. Across Ukraine, millions of children’s educations have been disrupted. Millions more children have fled the country and more than 500 have been killed.

Heather Murdock, VOA News, Lyman, Ukraine.

ELIZBETH LEE:

As Russia's war on Ukraine continues, Ukrainian leaders claim that Russia has been holding over 20,000 Ukrainians captive since the start of its full-scale invasion.

Reporting from Warsaw, Poland, journalist Lesia Bakalets shares the heart-wrenching story of a woman who has been anxiously waiting for her husband since his detention in October, when he was taken to a prison in Moscow.

Olga Kayova, Wife of Abducted Civilian:

He sent me this selfie and said, 'Look, I'm officially a volunteer now.

LESIA BAKALETS, VOA Correspondent:

Olga and Yuriy Kayovy are from Kherson, in southern Ukraine. When the war started, Yuriy joined the local Red Cross initiative, bringing humanitarian aid…

…from Ukrainian-controlled Zaporizhzhia to Kherson, which Russia occupied at the time. On one of these trips, Yuriy was arrested by Russian forces.

Olga Kayova, Wife of Abducted Civilian:

On August sixth, 2022, an acquaintance who was with Yuriy called me and told me that my husband had been detained.

LESIA BAKALETS, VOA Correspondent:

Later, she found out that her husband had been held in the occupied cities of Melitopol and Kherson and then transferred to a detention center in Simferopol. She heard no more and feared he was dead.

Olga Kayova, Wife of Abducted Civilian:

On October 6, a lawyer from Simferopol called me. She sent me a photo of a note handwritten by my husband. That's when I realized that he was alive. The lawyer said Yuriy was accused of participating in international terrorism.

LESIA BAKALETS, VOA Correspondent:

She said that a couple of weeks later, the lawyer informed her that her husband had been taken to the Lefortovo Prison in Moscow.

This October, it will be a year since he has been there. And there are many more like him, civilians whom Ukraine considers Russian-held hostages. The U.N. says there are hundreds of cases. Ukrainian leaders say there are tens of thousands.

Russia does not acknowledge holding civilians at all, let alone its reasons for doing so.

Alyona Lunyova, Human Rights Specialist:

The Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights claims about 23-thousand to 25-thousand Ukrainian civilian hostages. So, such a high number.

LESIA BAKALETS, VOA Correspondent:

The Kayov family's story was included in the film “HerSons," which was based on evidence collected by the Raphael Lemkin Center for Documenting Russian Crimes in Ukraine.

Hanna Berehova, Film Director:

(The) film has four stories about civilian hostages. Three of them are currently in prison in Russia – two in Moscow's Lefortovo prison. The third is in the city of Rostov. The fourth person spent 54 days in captivity in then-occupied Kherson and is now free.

LESIA BAKALETS, VOA Correspondent:

Director Hanna Berehova says there is enough material for at least three more sequels of the film.

Analysts say that the only thing relatives and human rights defenders can do for captive Ukrainian civilians is publicize their cases.

Unlike prisoners of war, abducted civilians are not part of exchanges under international law.

Alyona Lunyova, Human Rights Specialist:

Prisoners of war at least have an international status. It is stated in the Geneva Convention. But when it comes to civilian hostages, their captivity has no legal basis.

LESIA BAKALETS, VOA Correspondent:

She says that in any case, exchanging Ukrainian civilians for Russian prisoners of war is not an option for Ukraine.

Alyona Lunyova, Human Rights Specialist:

Without exaggeration, there are millions of Ukrainians in the occupied territories. And if the Ukrainian state allows exchange of Ukrainian civilians for Russian soldiers, then by tomorrow, we will have another 20 thousand plus civilian hostages.

LESIA BAKALETS, VOA Correspondent:

Ukrainian authorities and human rights activists are calling for international, third-party mediation to help gain the release of captured civilians.

Olga Kayova, meanwhile, has managed to find her husband a private lawyer.

Thanks to the lawyer’s efforts, she periodically gets notes from her husband that give her hope he will come home one day.

Lesia Bakalets, VOA News, Warsaw.

ELIZBETH LEE:

HENRY WILKINS, Reporting for VOA:

Rahaf is eighteen months old. She has just been brought to a field medical center, near Adre, Chad, to receive treatment for malnutrition.

Her mother, Riham Abdallah Idris, fled with her from Sudan's Darfur region three months ago. Since then, they have been in desperate need of food assistance, but almost none has arrived.

Riham Abdallah Idris, Sudanese Refugee:

Yes, it has been three months; we are facing a shortage of both food and funds. Unfortunately, there is an inadequate supply of nourishment for both children and mothers. The children are unwell.

HENRY WILKINS:

In August, Doctors Without Borders — also known as MSF, short for its French name Médecins Sans Frontières — called on the international community multiple times to give money to alleviate the Sudan crisis triggered by its civil war that started in April. They say that some refugees have gone five weeks without food aid, and that there is now a “malnutrition crisis,” in eastern Chad.

According to the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the international community has donated just 26 percent of the funding needed to deal with the crisis. Many humanitarian organizations in Eastern Chad say they are hamstrung as a result.

Kenneth Lavelle, an operations director with MSF, recently visited the refugee sites in eastern Chad.

Kenneth Lavelle, MSF:

I’ve not seen something like that in years. I was lost for words when I did the first tour around the Adre camp. It’s 200,000 people there in the most appalling conditions. I think we’re already beyond the brink. I think we’re already in a humanitarian catastrophe.

HENRY WILKINS:

The Sudanese government distributing food to its citizen in nearby Ourang, Chad, but what the war-torn country can provide is a drop in the ocean relative to the size of the need.

One Chadian analyst says that the host communities deserve a response, too, as the crisis strains the local market for food, and that a proper response could help prevent Sudan’s insecurity from spreading to Chad.

Remadji Hoinathy, Institute for Security Studies:

Actually finding a solution for the suffering of those in Chad might be also a way of contributing to conflict management and conflict prevention and ramping up insecurity in Chad as those people might be turning to illegal ways of earning a living. There are a lot of risks.

HENRY WILKINS:

Asked what the international community could do to help her and her baby, Idris said…

Riham Abdallah Idris, Sudanese Refugee:

It is imperative for them to furnish food for the infirm. For instance, biscuits or milk would be greatly appreciated, as malnutrition is affecting the children severely.

HENRY WILKINS:

As the desperately underfunded Sudan crisis continues, humanitarians say they are at a loss as to how to get donors' attention.

In recent months, South Sudan has received hundreds of thousands of the displaced, mostly returnees of South Sudanese origin, who pass through the town of Renk on the Sudan border here.

One, Yanar Leerwa, said she fled the country with no possessions.

Yanar Leerwa, South Sudanese Returnee:

I just fled without anything in hand. I wasn’t able to take anything from my home. We were living in a makeshift tent, so when the bombs started to fall on our compound we fled as fast as we could.

HENRY WILKINS:

As thousands continue to arrive in South Sudan every week, Egypt, on Sudan’s northern border, has effectively stopped refugees from entering the country. Initially it allowed around a quarter of a million to cross its border, but a new rule in June required Sudanese to obtain a visa to enter.

Rights groups say this “violates international standards,” and onerous wait times for visas endanger those trying to flee. Abdullahi Halakhe is with Refugees International.

Abdullahi Halakhe, Refugees International:

Egypt is also experiencing a serious economic crisis and, as a result, it is very, very careful in the number of people it’s allowing in and I think this is where countries like the United States need to lean on Egypt and UNHCR to ask the Egyptian authorities to allow the Sudanese to come in, but that is not enough.

HENRY WILKINS:

He added that donor countries must increase humanitarian funding to Egypt if they expect the country to begin taking refugees again.

Other Sudanese neighbors, including Libya and the Central African Republic have their own security problems, and few are seeking refuge in either country.

Fleeing to Eritrea, on Sudan’s eastern border, would be an even worse choice for those seeking to escape the war, according to Eritrea Focus, a U.K.-based human rights group. The government is known as one of the most authoritarian and isolationist regimes in the world, sometimes referred to as the North Korea of Africa.

Habte Hagos, Eritrea Focus:

The president has said that the Sudanese people are welcome to come to Eritrea, but how many Sudanese have actually taken that offer is unknown and why would anybody, why would anybody, want to seek refuge in Eritrea?

HENRY WILKINS:

As international aid groups are not active in Eritrea it is unclear whether any Sudanese refugees have arrived in the country.

But even for those who have managed to escape, like Bochra Hasan Abdallah, who recently arrived in Chad, the difficulties do not end.

Bochra Hasan Abdallah, Sudanese Refugee:

We were forced to abandon our homes due to attacks by Janjaweed. As you can see, our current circumstances are a result of this displacement. Regrettably, I had to leave without my identity documents.

HENRY WILKINS:

Lacking identity documents can make it hard for the displaced to register as refugees in Chad, in turn, making it difficult to obtain support.

As options for where to flee narrow, the number of internally displaced in Sudan is approaching 4 million, almost four times the number of refugees.

ELIZBETH LEE:

Once upon a time, Native Americans were deprived of education regarding their native cultures. They were coerced into attending residential schools operated by the U.S. government, which had a preference for assimilation.

However, in present times, there are only a few schools remaining that not only acknowledge but also celebrate Native culture. VOA’s Mike O’Sullivan went to Riverside, California to tell us more.

MIKE O’SULLIVAN, Reporting for VOA:

Through much of the 19th and part of the 20th century, U.S. authorities forced many Indigenous children into boarding schools, where they learned domestic and farming skills, and were forced to abandon their religions, languages and cultures.

In Riverside, California, family members heard the stories of survivors at Sherman Indian High School, one of a handful of remaining government-funded boarding schools, where today native cultures are embraced instead of suppressed.

U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland and Assistant Secretary Bryan Newland, both Native Americans, came to listen as part of the department's year-long tour called “The Road to Healing.”

Mavany Calac Verdugo, Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians:

I’m here because I wanted to see where my grandparents went to school, where they were taken, and also where my dad was born.

MIKE O’SULLIVAN:

Her grandparents fell in love here, and her family adopted a strategy to fight prejudice.

Mavany Calac Verdugo, Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians:

They came out of the situation basically saying, 'Well, the white man won the war, and maybe the only way to end discrimination for our kids would be education.'”

MIKE O’SULLIVAN:

Some stories ended badly. About 60 former Sherman Indian High School students who died while attending the school are buried in a nearby cemetery, victims through the years of disease or accidents. At some Indian schools, students were the victims of abuse.

But Erica Ben, a Navajo and more recent student here, says her time at the school expanded her horizons. She’s working on a doctorate in the field of Native education.

Erica Ben, Former Student:

I never really encountered anybody other than Navajo, so when I came here and the school was open to all students all across the nation, that was my actual first time interacting with other Native tribes, and for me, that was an experience I’m not going to forget.

MIKE O’SULLIVAN:

Greg Calac of the Luiseño Indians sees renewed interest in the traditions among young people.

Greg Calac, Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians:

All four of my children are participating in the cultural things that our tribe is offering, including basket weaving, including language, beading and such.

MIKE O’SULLIVAN:

Like many Native Americans, they're re-embracing their culture and learning about a painful history of forced assimilation.

Mike O’Sullivan, VOA News, Riverside, California.

ELIZBETH LEE:

Thank you for being with us. Stay up to date with all the latest news at VOAnews.com.

Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at VOA News. Follow me on X, formerly Twitter, at EleeTV1. Catch up on past episodes at our free streaming service, VOA Plus. For all those behind the scenes who brought you today's show, I am Elizabeth Lee. We'll see you next week on The Inside Story.

###