A Day in the Citizen Training School

By Claire Reichenbach 

Just over halfway through our time here in Guatemala, our group had the opportunity to attend a program entitled the Citizen Training School. The Citizen Training School is composed of university-aged students and runs from March to November with training modules every other Saturday. Each training is centered on some political question or issue. We were lucky enough to be able to participate in one of these training sessions, focused on state configuration in Guatemala and Central America. 

The Universidad de Rafael Landívar hosted the training, where we were able to meet and learn alongside Guatemalan university students. During our training, speaker Byron S. Morales Dardón spoke to us about how Guatemala’s current government came to be and what it means to be involved in Guatemalan politics today. Morales discussed how a democracy forms and what it means to be a democracy. We even did an activity simulating what a democracy should and shouldn’t look like. 

During this simulation, we learned the difference between a democracy and an autocracy or dictatorship. One phrase that Morales used was, “We the people.” Typically these words, when strung together, refer to the United States’ Declaration of Independence, but Morales reminded us that these words do not belong to one nation or one group of people. Instead, they belong to each and every democracy around the world. 

Near the end of his lecture, Morales opened the floor to participants. A phrase that he used was, “Lucha por la justicia y la democracia” or “Fight for justice and democracy.” This was quickly followed by the question, “What do we do next?” The group consensus was that we should continue to educate others about politics; make decisions for a future 30 years down the road, not just for tomorrow; and trust that even if we cannot fight it all today, we can still begin. 

Morales’s last piece that he left us with was to remember that, “Our job is to keep hope alive.”

After the first session, we got into groups with the Guatemalan students and discussed what we observe as the primary problems in both the United States and Guatemala and how they pertain to us. We then wrote down our discussion on a poster and presented our thoughts to the whole group. Although there were differences, there were also similarities between both countries and their political issues. One point we ended up emphasizing was how the political actions of the U.S. impact other countries, especially Latin America. 

Our day concluded by holding hands in a group dance filled with laughter and joy. Although I will not rewrite all the lyrics, the key chorus of the song encouraged us to “Celebrar la vida, celebrar la vida” (Celebrate life, celebrate life). I think our time here in Guatemala has done a good job emphasizing that for us.