IN the heart of Page, Arizona, in the United States, Jamaican Jodian Brown has become an ambassador for her country’s culture, spreading the island vibes and bridging divides with her students in the classroom.

A native of Crawle River, Clarendon, the 39-year-old left the island in 2019 on a cultural exchange teaching programme that saw her assigned to Desert View Intermediate School, where she teaches students in grades three to five.

Upon her arrival she was welcomed into a community filled with residents and children from various cultural backgrounds, whom she sought to learn more about while also giving them a taste of the Caribbean.

“Normally, in class we have a moment where we do a brain break, and we will play songs and they’ll dance around, but for some reason, one time, I thought, ‘Let me put on a dancehall [song] and see how they are going to react,’ ” said Brown.

“I put on one of those Ding Dong songs — I think it was Bounce — and they started looking at me weird like, ‘Ms Brown, what’s that?’ But I was like, ‘Come on guys, let me show you how to do the bounce; this is a Jamaican thing,’ and we were bouncing and doing our little thing,” she said, laughing as she recalled the moment.

From that moment her students grew curious about Jamaican culture and wanted to share a bit of their own with their new educator. Brown’s classroom was transformed into a cultural hub — with a Jamaican corner where students can learn about Bob Marley, athletes like Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Usain Bolt, food, the national anthem, the national heroes, and even the country’s pledge.

Brown shared that students eagerly absorbed Jamaican patois, history, traditions, and information about landmarks such as Dunn’s River Falls, broadening their perspectives.

“I was teaching them how to say a few words. The most popular one would be, ‘Wah gwan,’ because when they come to the door, instead of just saying, ‘Hello, good morning.’ ‘Hi, how are you?’ I teach them how to say ‘Wah gwan?’ And, of course, I give them the response, ‘Mi good’ or ‘Mi deh yah,’ ” she told the Jamaica Observer.

Brown also shared that she even had a group of students who could recite the Jamaican pledge, often studying it when they visited the Jamaican corner in her classroom.

Since she has been at the institution she shared that she’s also managed to share aspects of Jamaica’s culture with other faculty members, often asking her relatives to travel with Jamaican snacks — such as banana chips and coconut drops — whenever they visit her in Arizona.

“We try to blend things in here with whatever is going on in Jamaica, so on Heroes’ Day or in February we do something at our school, we dress up, and we have students running up and asking, ‘Are you celebrating something in Jamaica today?’ ” she laughed.

With a student population that is 80 per cent native American and a few Hispanics, she said her institution encourages students to embrace their heritage.

“In mid-September to mid-October we just celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month and so that was an opportunity in my classroom, too, where I acknowledged my Hispanic students, and we were learning the salsa together with our Spanish-speaking students. November has started and we are celebrating Native American and Indian Month, and it’s all going to be a big assembly across the school district. We acknowledge, and we embrace, and we learn about each other’s culture,” explained Brown.

A seasoned teacher with more than 10 years’ experience in the Jamaican education system, Brown shared that she left the island to join the cultural exchange programme because she was losing her fire for teaching and wanted to reignite it by being in a place that would challenge her, provide new experiences, and foster professional growth.

She expressed that she’s always had a love for teaching and would often, in her younger days, rally students in her community to help them with their homework. This she did with the help of her mother, Valrie Brown, who she credits as her biggest motivator and inspiration.

Brown also lauded the Jamaican education system, noting that it equipped her with the skills to take on the new journey in the US.

“I have always said that if I didn’t have such [an] extensive background in Jamaica, being a strong teacher and a tough teacher, then I may not have been able to survive here — coming into a new culture. It is that strong foundation in Jamaica with being a strong teacher, just learning to overcome all the challenges — facing tough colleagues, facing tough families — and just the diverse schools that I’ve been a part of that prepared me,” she told the Sunday Observer.

Brown’s enthusiasm for the profession and her love for her students propelled her to new heights in Arizona where she was last month listed as one of the top five teachers in the state by Arizona Educational Foundation, surpassing 625 other educators who were nominated.

“It’s really been an honour. I know I said I started out wanting everyone to know my name but honestly, I didn’t realise that it could get to this magnitude. In all of the noise that’s going on I really feel like it has been an honour and also a very humbling moment because I’m just grateful that I could stand among the best of the teachers in Arizona, to be among the talented educators statewide,” she expressed, her voice filled with joy as she reflected on her accomplishment.

When asked if she would ever return to Jamaica she said she cannot not find it within herself to leave her students and the strong connection she has made with colleagues, parents, and residents of Page, but might return at a later time.

“There is no me without my students. Even to be recognised in this moment, my students are the ones who allowed that to happen because it is through their individual differences and their backgrounds, that is where I developed my strength and my understanding in the classroom in Arizona — and I use them to grow,” said Brown.

“It’s my experience with them that allows me to bloom and develop into this well-rounded educator, so my students are everything to me. There is no me without them,” she said.