The best teacher in the world? African, Franciscan, and determined. Meet Peter Tabichi.

Peter Tabichi, Has , and he has never traveled in his life. Until a few days ago, when he took a plane to reach the luxurious city of skyscrapers, Dubai.
From Africa, where he was born, to the United Arab Emirates, to collect a prestigious award: the Global Teacher Prize 2019, an award that rewards the best teacher in the world.  

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BEST TEACHER IN THE WORLD

For a week now, Peter has been considered the best teacher in the world, and it's not hard to understand the jury's reasoning. Just listen to the statements of this Kenyan professor, not yet forty, to understand the reasons for his award.
Teacher of mathematics and physics in NakuruIn the heart of Rift ValleyA region often affected by drought and famine, so much so that in the Maasai language it means "dusty land." A harsh and hostile land where one in three students comes from a poor family, is an orphan, and often malnourished.

All Keriko Secondary School, then, a large number of male and female students bring with them terrible experiences, a baggage of drug addiction, early pregnancy, dropping out of school or suicide attempts.

It's no surprise that for Peter, teaching is first and foremost a way to dedicate himself to others. A mission, before a job. His motto, certainly, is do more than talk, so he decided to enrich his life and that of his students by dedicating himself with absolute dedication to many different educational projects. Officially he is a professor, humanly he is a Franciscan friar and a great educator: he uses difficulties as a stimulus to not give up, he talks with students and teaches them, first of all, to talk to each other, to communicate.

In a difficult land like Kenya, tormented by ethnic conflicts and bloody feuds, it's not easy.
And then Father Tabichi rolls up his sleeves and organizes sports activities, electrostatics projects to learn how to get energy from plants, lessons to learn love for nature and the environment or to cultivate with the minimum waste of waterAll this without the massive use of today's learning support technologies.
In Peter's school, in fact, we work with one computer for 8 different classes, poor internet connectivity and, to make matters worse, frequent power outages.

GLOBAL TEACHER PRIZE 2019

The jury of the award, founded by an Indian billionaire philanthropist, Sunny Varkey, he could only choose the Kenyan professor, for the creativity and dedication with which he approaches his work every day. Observing the results he achieves and the added value he brings to the students and the institute, one understands well what is meant by the overused expression 'vocational profession'.

Called to evaluate both the teaching and the context in which the teacher moves, certainly the Varkey Foundation and its president could not have chosen a better professor among the approximately 40 thousand candidates scrutinized. Among them, also an Italian, Joseph Paschetto, mathematics teacher at the lower secondary school of Garbaccio di Mosso, in the province of Biella.

He also stood out for the particular dedication with which he approaches the profession of trainer: some of the results of his commitment are the fountains powered by solar power, an ecological path with educational signs and a “park library”.

Just like Peter Tabichi, Professor Paschetto first dedicated himself tocultural integration, teaching in a school with many girls and boys from other backgrounds, and he did it not with sport, as his Kenyan colleague decided to do, but with astronomy.
With the project “Hill of the Stars” He organizes astronomical observation evenings for his students, where they learn the names of the stars and constellations in both Arabic and Italian, to help break down language barriers.

As actor Hugh Jackman said when he presented Peter with the award at the ceremony, “The real superheroes are the teachers who change the world.” And we agree.

(Featured image from illibraio.it)

STORIES OF SPECIAL SCHOOLS

• In Piacenza there is a school that screens children's cell phones to encourage them to talk to each other again;
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