Jill Stiemsma, retired teacher and volunteer

Made it to the top of the volcano!  I'm in the middle!

Hi.  I’m Jill Stiemsma, a retired college instructor from Wisconsin. I first became aware of CIS when I joined an SOA-Watch delegation that traveled to El Salvador to

honor the 30^th anniversary of Oscar Romero’s assassination.  SOA-Watch contracted with CIS to lead this delegation, and it was truly an amazing experience.  As luck would have it, two other members on the trip had previously studied Spanish in a Bolivian language school and encouraged me to do the same. As a 60-year-old Spanish student, I was struggling in basic University courses back home.

So, yes, I spent six months in Bolivia.  But when I returned home, I thought, “What can I do now to keep using my Spanish?”  And in the mysterious ways of the universe, what would appear in the mail the very next day but a letter from CIS, wondering if I’d be interested in teaching English for them.  Would I be interested???  What a silly question!  I immediately applied.

Jill with her first group of Beginner English Students at the CIS

I’m now teaching my fourth English cycle over a five-year span and have made seven trips to El Salvador, all told.  I’ve been an English teacher, a Spanish student (as a CIS English teacher, I pay half price for my classes), an Elections Observer, and a member of one other CIS delegation (the last one for the beatification of Oscar Romero).  Because of CIS’ Cultural Program and organized teacher trips, I have a really good background in the Salvadoran Reality.

Since teachers must pay their own transportation and housing costs here, why would I keep coming back, especially to a country deemed so unsafe?  Quite frankly, I get a lot more out of working and living directly with Salvadorans than they get from me.  When I enter El Salvador these days, I immediately sense that “I am home”.  I firmly believe US citizens owe El Salvador a lot, given our funding of their Civil War and our sending planeloads of gang members back to El Salvador, sometimes daily (and then having the audacity to admonish them for not solving “their” gang problem). 

Getting coffee during election observations

Am I safe?  I think so.  I don’t take public transportation or walk at night; CIS places us in decent (though not fancy) housing in non-gang neighborhoods.  As a gringo, I’m less likely to be harmed anyway (or so I think).  I know enough not to argue with robbers; I’ll just give them what they want.  Here, the teachers’ biggest complaints revolve around taking cold showers, quite frankly!

Please come.  Please support CIS as a teacher, as a traveler, as a language learner.  The experience will change your life.  It absolutely will.