Eleven-year-old Melissa sits in a yellow schoolhouse on the outskirts of Tijuana, joining the chorus of voices answering a teacher who instructs the class on long division.

While dividing 5,789 by 3 might be tedious for some, Melissa says she’s thrilled to crunch numbers. It’s been almost six months since she and her family fled home – and her studies – in the western Mexican state of Michoacán due to violent threats and relentless extortion.

Her family has been languishing in a migrant shelter, waiting to get an appointment with United States officials to request asylum – a disheartening reality for millions of migrants in northern Mexican border cities over the past three years, since the U.S. issued Title 42. But the shelter pivoted to address this growing need, opening the school, and making this limbo just a little easier on kids like Melissa.

“I’m learning again,” she says, grinning.

The new school at the Embajadores de Jesús migrant shelter exemplifies the ways in which Mexican civil society has adapted to increased migrant flows amid Title 42, which virtually sealed off U.S. ports of entry to noncitizens and those without visas and put a traditionally transient population in a holding pattern. Ever since, Mexicans have leaned into flexibility to face the changing populations in their towns and cities and had to rethink the rights of migrants – and their role towards and obligations to them – in ways that will likely outlast Title 42 when it expires May 11.

Throughout all the change in Mexico wrought by U.S. policy, one thing is clear, says Pat Murphy, who directs the Casa del Migrante, another Tijuana shelter: “Our ability to adapt to new realities that come our way always astounds me.”

Whitney Eulich

Melissa, center with back to camera, works through math problems in this fifth and sixth grade classroom at a new public school at the Embajadores de Jesús migrant shelter on the outskirts of Tijuana, April 27, 2023. Her family has been held up in northern Mexico for six months while they wait for their chance to seek asylum in the U.S.

Migration confusion

Since March 2020, the U.S. has used its authority under the public health law known as Title 42 to rapidly expel migrants and suspend their right to seek asylum. U.S. Customs and Border Protection carried out more than 2.8 million expulsions of migrants under it. However, those encounters are not equivalent to unique individuals, who at times have tried to cross more than once.

The rule, implemented by the Trump administration, was enacted as a means of containing the spread of COVID-19. But it quickly transformed into a tool for controlling migration. It has faced legal challenges but has stood until now. The official U.S. end to the public health emergency, including Title 42, is set for May 11.

The policy sowed confusion for migrants, advocates, and lawyers, and the lifting of it will create new questions. Shelters like Casa del Migrante have already reported seeing more migrants arriving in Tijuana as the law’s expiration nears, some erroneously believing that the U.S. asylum system will end May 11.

At the same time, new processes are coming into place. The U.S. debuted a phone application in January for scheduling appointments with U.S. officials (CBP One) that has confounded many migrants, and President Joe Biden announced the opening of regional centers in Central and South America to process asylum claims, which could create new pressures in those countries – as it has in Mexico.

One of the biggest challenges for Mexico with Title 42 has come down to simple volume. Migrant centers, used to a more transient population, have been saturated beyond capacity, causing temporary tent cities to emerge – even in Mexico City. This spring an informal camp of asylum-seekers grew in a plaza in a trendy, touristy neighborhood of the capital. That’s caused some tensions, but also led locals to new solutions.

Change in an instant

Along the border in Ciudad Juárez, across from El Paso, Damaris Hernández remembers her shock last fall as she watched the first encampment of migrants in her memory grow on the banks of the Rio Grande.

Alicia Fernández/Special to the Christian Science Monitor

A group of migrants spends time at the abandoned house where they live in Ciudad Juárez, on the border with El Paso, Texas, on April 26, 2023.

As temperatures fell toward freezing, she was sitting in a meeting with other pastors planning their foundation’s annual holiday events, when the conversation turned toward the informal camp. One of the pastors mentioned his great-grandparents had constructed a building not far from the growing tent city that was sitting uninhabited.

A plan emerged to install some showers and toilets in the building, which migrants staying at the camp could walk a few blocks to use. But within days the tents were torn down and migrants evicted, and Ms. Hernández says the team simply took their initial plan to the next level, turning the building into a makeshift shelter known as the Hope Center. “Living in a border city, you know everything can change in an instant,” she says. 

They painted the walls muted pinks and yellows, made a list of house rules, and offered up simple bedrolls and some warm meals. Women and children sleep upstairs, families are in the kitchen, and single men sleep in the entry hall. The center has been full beyond its capacity of 100 people ever since.

Elsewhere in the city, migrants have found their own solutions. Manuel Alejandro and his younger brother arrived six months ago, fleeing a crushing economic and political situation back home in Venezuela.

With shelters full and room rentals out of their budget, they got a tip: look for abandoned buildings.

Following years of brutal cartel violence and poor city planning, Ciudad Juárez has a glut of abandoned housing – more than 70,500 buildings, according to the National Institute of Statistics and Geography. Across the sprawling city, migrants are squatting in these dilapidated former homes and businesses, waiting for their chance to get an appointment through the CBP One app – or for U.S. border policies to change.

About 30 minutes by foot from Juárez’s historic center, the young men found a roof under which to sleep, but the walls are crumbling in and there are no windows or doors. “I was nervous to come in, but it was better than sleeping on the street,” says the young man in his late 20s.

They’ve also been shown solidarity on the part of locals. The 14 Venezuelans now staying here, mostly young men and a few women, have met the owner and regularly interact with neighbors, who come by with food or water. One neighbor helped them dig a hole for an improvised outhouse in the front yard.

“I’ve met so many people in Mexico with giving hearts,” says Gabriel Inserry, another Venezuelan staying here. “But why is the U.S. trying to make our situation a ‘mission impossible?’ There has to be another solution than sitting in an abandoned home and surviving.”

For Alivei, a local teenager who lives across the street, not helping her new, temporary neighbors doesn’t feel like an option, although her mother doesn’t approve.

“They’re good people. I see them around and I hear their stories and I can’t help but want to help,” she says of sneaking the Venezuelans food, water, or blankets when her mom isn’t home. “They’re my friends.”

A migrant disaster

The influx of migrants across Mexico and the shortage of housing and services has meant opportunity for cartels and other criminals, from sex traffickers to human traffickers, to exploit them, says Melisa Viruete, who runs the legal clinic at the Espacio Migrante shelter and resource center in Tijuana.

Whitney Eulich

Antonio Sánchez, who was internally displaced in Mexico due to violence, teaches fifth and sixth grade at the newly inaugurated public school at the Embajadores de Jesús migrant shelter on the outskirts of Tijuana.

The increasingly visible population of migrants in Juárez has also led to stricter enforcement of Mexican immigration controls in February and March, says Josep Herreros, associate protection representative at the United Nations’ refugee agency in Mexico. Raids on migrants begging at city intersections or sleeping on the streets then led to an uptick in detentions, legal in Mexico if the migrant is in the country without necessary paperwork.

Eric, a young father from Venezuela, was caught up in one of those raids – and he almost became a victim of one of the worst migrant disasters in Mexico since Title 42.

He and his family of four were detained by Mexican immigration officers on March 27 while selling candy at a stoplight in Juárez, and were released that night. Not long after, around 10 p.m., a fire tore through the immigration detention center, killing 40 migrants – including three of Eric’s good friends. Surveillance video shows no agents attempted to free the migrants, who are shown kicking and pulling on the cell door, trying to get out.

Eric helped set up a vigil for his friends outside the detention center, with posters that read “40 sacrificed for the dream of thousands of people.” He says he was violently harassed by Mexican officials while camping out by that vigil, which spooked him so much that he turned himself into U.S. border agents in search of asylum. Instead, the family was expelled to Tijuana under Title 42.

“I always thought if you did things correctly, it would work out,” he says of his family’s search for protection, currently at a shelter in Tijuana. “At this point, I’d rather die fighting for justice in Mexico than waiting for something to change back home.”

“This is a stain on our country. People should be able to turn to an immigration officer, a security officer for help,” not die at their hands, says José María García Lara, who runs the Tijuana shelter Movimiento Juventud 2000.

In January this year, Mexico received roughly 13,000 applications for asylum – more than double the number the same month in 2022, according to Mexico’s refugee assistance agency. Mexico has progressive asylum laws, says Mr. Herreros from the U.N., but “there are no legal pathways or alternatives for migrants who aren’t refugees,” he says. It’s “overwhelming the asylum system.”

The government has pledged to reform the agency that controls migration inside Mexico, the National Immigration Institute. One prominent immigration-rights advocate has called for the agency’s abolishment, recommending that it be replaced with a new government entity led by those with direct experience aiding migrants in civil society.

Their call is part of a shifting mindset towards migration that may be less impermanent than Mexico is historically accustomed to.

This is apparent in the transformation of the Embajadores de Jesús shelter over the past several years, a one-time church-turned-dormitory for migrants that has become its own community. Today, with support from partners like the University of California San Diego’s Center on Global Justice, it consists of multistory modern structures, an outdoor kitchen, event space, and plans for vital services like a 24-hour health clinic, slated to open in September. Last month, the shelter inaugurated the school, which is recognized by Mexico’s secretariat of education, where Melissa is happily working through math problems. 

Antonio Sánchez says it was a blessing to return to teaching more than a year after he fled his home in central Mexico due to extortion and the kidnapping of one of his sons. He was a primary school teacher for 26 years before giving everything up for his family’s safety, and he sees a shift in the kids here since starting school: “They have purpose, they’re united.”

Like most at the shelter, he’s biding his time until he secures an appointment with U.S. border patrol to make his family’s asylum claim. “We all have to wait. Longer than most of us ever expected. But, this,” he says, gesturing out the window at the basketball court and the shelter’s vast, growing infrastructure, “this is for people to learn and not fall too far behind while they wait.”

Editor's note: The story has been updated to clarify the immigration status of the people Title 42 blocked from arriving in the U.S.

Erika Page/The Christian Science Monitor

The University of Buenos Aires faculty of law on the first day of classes of the 2023 academic year, March 15, 2023. Villa 31, one of Buenos Aires' most iconic informal settlements, is visible in the background.

On the surface, Argentina’s public universities are some of the most inclusive in the world: Tuition is free, and there’s no application process, entry exam, nor caps on admission.

Inclusivity has long been a governing principle for public universities here. But while anyone can begin a degree, few make it to graduation – and only one-fifth of college-aged Argentines enroll in the first place.

The reasons vary, from inadequate preparation in public high schools to the economic hurdles of paying for books or rent while in college. Funding one’s university education is particularly difficult in a country with unusually long degree programs, which last a minimum of five and often more like nine years. 

The system does little to correct existing disparities, and the graduation rates don’t bode well for a nation struggling with brain drain and hoping to climb out of a drawn-out economic crisis. Reversing the trend may depend on creating inclusive policies that go beyond surface level, accompanying students throughout their educational trajectory, while putting more emphasis on quality and not access alone.

Erika Page/The Christian Science Monitor

On the first day of classes, first-year students are led by a professor on a tour of the law faculty at the University of Buenos Aires, March 15, 2023.

“Argentina was historically the country with the most educational and human capital in Latin America ... which is what constitutes the real wealth of a nation,” says Marcelo Rabossi, an expert in higher education policy at the Universidad Torcuato Di Tella in Buenos Aires. But that level has “long been falling.” 

“Anyone who enters university has a certain hope ... to change their reality,” says Juan Lopensino, an engineering professor at the Technical University of Córdoba. He says fewer than 10% of students make it to graduation in his department. Across disciplines, the national average at public universities is 30%.

“With such a high drop-out rate, we are creating social problems. ... We are producing a frustrated generation.” 

‘An illusion’

On the first day of class in her eighth and final year of a law degree, Natalia Villagra emerges from the subway station running an hour late. Between a half-time job at a shoe shop, a 1.5-hour commute from the outskirts of Buenos Aires, and frequent metro interruptions, she’s mastered the art of moving quickly without appearing flustered. 

As she climbs the stairs of the law faculty, one of the city’s biggest slums is visible to her right. 

“Any young person from the ‘villa’ could easily come to study here,” she says. But she knows how unlikely that is. In her own working-class neighborhood, many of her high school classmates were starting families by their late teens, and most took whatever jobs they could get. Ms. Villagra herself paused her studies multiple times to work full time, not sure if she would be able to return.

According to a 2021 study from the Observatory of Argentines for Education, a non-governmental organization that monitors educational data with the aim to strengthen public education, students from the lowest income decile make up 8% of college freshman. By the fifth year, that falls to 1%.

“Open access ends up being an illusion,” says Dr. Rabossi. “There is inclusion in admission, but selectivity and elitism in graduation.” 

When university became free and universal in 1949, it was meant to be a hallmark of social mobility that could prepare a broad middle class to participate meaningfully in democracy. That’s what Isabel Bohorquez calls the “Argentine dream.” 

“We all buy the story, but the university system never managed to become truly of the people,” says Dr. Bohorquez, a former university rector of the Provincial University of Córdoba. She says the narrative makes it difficult to criticize flaws in the system today. “It’s become something untouchable.”

Inclusion vs. quality

Open college admission comes at a cost. First- and second-year lectures can fill up to double or even triple classroom capacity, with some students sitting on the floor or listening from hallways. In some tracks, like medicine, it can mean fewer materials available per student to gain hands-on experience. The dilemma gets at the relationship between inclusivity and quality, a sensitive and highly politicized topic in education. 

“I don’t believe in that dichotomy,” says Dr. Rabossi. “But there have to be certain conditions in place so that they don’t clash. And the problem for me is that in Argentina, inclusion ends up affecting quality.”

Erika Page/The Christian Science Monitor

Natalia Villagra poses for a photo on the first day of the 8th year of her law degree at the University of Buenos Aires, March 15, 2023.

The problems begin long before the university level. In private high schools, 64% of students graduate on time, compared with 36% in public schools, which serve the vast majority of Argentines. And there are no national exams at the end of high school to measure students’ level of preparedness for college. Proposals to introduce selectivity exams are met with fierce opposition.

“Here in Argentina, it’s very complicated to talk about merit. For many social sectors ‘merit’ is a bad word,” says Camila Roig, who began volunteering with a network called Organized Students in her last year of high school out of frustration with extended school COVID-19 closures. With the pandemic behind them, the group has turned its attention to other challenges facing the public education system.

According to the most recent Program for International Student Assessment, 69% of Argentine students are low achievers in math, compared with an average among Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development member countries of 24%.

Now a second-year political science student at the University of Buenos Aires, Ms. Roig supports the widespread commitment in Argentina to education as a human right, but says that shouldn’t stymie conversations about raising educational standards. 

To improve high school dropout rates, recent government initiatives have instead opted to make it easier for students to continue to the next year of schooling. For Dr. Bohorquez, that’s not doing the country – or those students – any favors.

“If you hand out academic success, you’re actually ‘othering’ the students you hope to include, because you’re not requiring anything substantial from them,” she says.

Neighboring countries have found solutions to some of the problems Argentina faces. After investing heavily in elementary and high school education, Chile now graduates more university-educated professionals than Argentina, with less than half the population. In Uruguay, a solidarity fund financed by graduates of public universities over the course of their careers provides grants to cover living expenses for low-income students.

Ideas for reform are occasionally floated in Argentina, like making degrees shorter, improving funding for disadvantaged students, charging tuition for international pupils, and strengthening ties between universities and related institutions that train teachers and technicians. But none have gained traction. Meanwhile, the national government has proposed opening eight new universities to broaden accessibility, despite calls for a focus on quality over quantity.

A bright light

Early on in his chemistry degree, Enzo Centurion lost track of the number of all-nighters he was spending trying to catch up to his classmates. In his family of five, only his mother studied beyond high school, earning her elementary school teaching degree.

“It was like starting from zero,” says Mr. Centurion, now in his sixth year.

He was only able to move to the city of Rosario to study thanks to the nonprofit Fundación Sí, which runs housing residences for promising students without universities in their hometowns. Scholarships offered by the government are scant and rarely are enough to cover living expenses.

Despite the imperfections, he sees higher education as one of Argentina’s brightest lights – and is planning to go into scientific research.

“If it weren’t for public university, I would never have been able to study. So I’m making the very most of it.”

Malcolm Gladwell’s 2008 book “Outliers” popularized the idea that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to achieve mastery in any skill. Adam Gopnik’s captivating book “The Real Work” honors perseverance, but it rejects such easy formulations, as its subtitle, “On the Mystery of Mastery,” suggests. In a collection of essays, the New Yorker critic puts himself in the hands of experts in a range of fields, including drawing, boxing, baking, and even driving, in an effort to understand how virtuosos attain their proficiency.

The title borrows a phrase used by magicians: When they refer to “the real work,” Gopnik writes, they mean “the accumulated craft, savvy, and technical mastery that makes a great magic trick great.” Magic, of course, is an art whose mysteries are meant to remain concealed. In the book’s rich chapter on the subject, Gopnik points out that because magicians’ techniques are intentionally obscured from spectators, it is, paradoxically, more difficult to discern their subtle mastery.

The same cannot be said for drawing. The skill involved in deploying a pencil to accurately represent an object invites appreciation from viewers. Gopnik, who writes art criticism while acutely aware that he lacks artistic talent, apprentices himself to Jacob Collins, a classical realist painter who runs a New York City atelier. The author’s initial sketches are discouraging, with his attempt to draw an eye, he laments, resembling “a football inside a pair of parentheses.” After his first lesson, he writes, “I was filled with feelings of helplessness and stupidity and impotence that I had not experienced since elementary school.” 

That response will likely resonate with those who’ve taken on the challenge of trying something new. Some, like Gopnik, will have to reach back to childhood for memories of incompetence. As we age, wishing to avoid those unpleasant sensations, we increasingly stick with what we know how to do well, the author observes. Despite his discomfort, however, he continues with his drawing classes. As he makes progress, he learns a simple but profound lesson that is threaded throughout the book, that accomplishment is “a composite of small steps.”

There’s comfort in that notion, as it makes the formidable task of acquiring a new skill more manageable. The book offers additional comforts as well. One is that mastery is not only the province of recognized experts; rather, it surrounds us in our everyday lives. Gopnik, a resident of New York City for decades, didn’t learn to drive until late middle age. One of the book’s chapters is a fond portrayal of his enthusiastic driving instructor, Arturo Leon, who in their first moments together has his inexperienced, panicked student drive directly into rush-hour traffic. Leon turns out to be a deft teacher, and by chapter’s end, Gopnik has his license in hand.

Similarly, the master baker Gopnik asks to instruct him is not a celebrity chef but his own mother, a retired college professor whose zeal for baking seems superhuman. “As a kid, I never left for school without being equipped with croissants or pain au chocolat or cinnamon babka or sticky buns, often in combination,” he recalls of his childhood in Montreal. Years later, during an intensive weekend of mixing and kneading and rolling, she shares her knowledge and techniques with him.

The publication in which Gopnik’s work usually appears is known for its impeccable copy editing, which is perhaps another example of the hidden mastery all around us. That thought was prompted by my stumbling over several typos in the book, with the misspelling of Gatsby’s Tom Buchanan being the most egregious. 

While Gopnik admires the masters around him, he makes clear that we need not strive for perfection in all that we do. “We can do some things badly and still feel good about having done them, and some things well and still feel badly about not doing them better,” he observes. Offering a personal example, he writes, “I take as much pleasure from playing ‘Lullaby of Birdland’ badly as George Shearing did in writing it well.” Mastery has its place, but so too does joy. Perhaps the most fortunate among us are those for whom the two go hand in hand.

A sea of colorful tops and billowing pants pop across the stage – turquoise, fuchsia, and canary yellow – as a community choir gets into position at The Capri in North Minneapolis. It’s the group’s spring concert and if the light bouncing off the singers’ clothes is any indication, tonight’s show is going to be a joyful experience.

“I’m so happy to see your smiling faces tonight!” says J.D. Steele, the director of Capri Glee!, stepping out in a tropical print shirt and white jeans. Soon he is off – bounding around the stage, light as a feather, throwing his arms into the air as he leads the choir, and the audience, in “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song),” a tribute to the late Harry Belafonte.

The concert is the culmination of six weeks of hard work for the just over 100 members. Some have singing experience, some don’t – no auditions are required to join. Most have signed up for the spring season for one reason: a pure love of singing. 

The cross-generational, multiracial, and multireligious choir is in its eighth year, with Mr. Steele at the helm. As a member of The Steeles, a family of five siblings who has become a mainstay of Minnesota’s music scene, Mr. Steele brings a wealth of expertise. The Steeles have recorded and performed with Prince, actor Morgan Freeman, and producer Jimmy Jam, and have traveled the world with their soulful sound.

More importantly, Mr. Steele wants to show choir members that singing has the power to heal and build community – a need that has been especially evident post-pandemic as people look for ways to regroup.

Rehearsals and concerts are held here in North Minneapolis, an area of the city that has struggled to shed its decadeslong image as crime-laden and impoverished. Mr. Steele hopes that the Capri Glee! choir can help people in the Twin Cities, Minneapolis and St. Paul, share and learn from one another, and – most of all – uplift.

“I wanted a multicultural choir, where we could teach inspiration, love, and joy,” says Mr. Steele after the show. “When we keep singing, we keep growing. ... I want people to see that music makes community.”

The Capri Glee! adult community choir began in February 2015, on the initiative of The Capri’s then-director, Karl Reichert. The Steele family, who had performed for the company’s galas, was known in the community, and eldest brother J.D. was a natural choice to lead the choir. Mr. Steele was already heading up two local choirs, one for adults and one for young people.

Paul Irmiter/Courtesy of The Capri

The Capri Glee! community choir’s more than 100 members practiced for six weeks ahead of their spring concert on April 25 at The Capri in North Minneapolis.

“What Karl was trying to create was to bring different people from different backgrounds together, and J.D. is a master of that,” says James Scott, current director of The Capri, which is part of the Plymouth Christian Youth Center (PCYC) – a nonprofit focused on uplifting youth and adults. “What anyone outside of North Minneapolis sees is violence, drugs, gangs. But what we see here is a group of people who are just trying to live our lives. The Glee choir is that intersection between art and community.”

The Capri, originally built as a movie theater in 1927 called the Paradise, was once a cultural hub for people in the neighborhood, which had a large Jewish and African American population. For decades, the community lived in relative harmony.

Then, on the night of July 19, 1967, racial tensions boiled over. Violence erupted on Plymouth Avenue, and local businesses –
many of which were owned by Jewish people – were set alight.

In the decades that followed, the neighborhood became more diverse, but it also grew to be known for its rising crime. Today, the neighborhoods surrounding The Capri have the highest level of gun violence in the city and one of the worst educational achievement gaps in the nation.

Several nonprofits in the neighborhood, in addition to the PCYC, are dedicated to reversing that trend. The Northside Achievement Zone aims to reduce educational and social disparities, and a local real estate developer has invested heavily in bringing business to North Minneapolis.

“Some people only see the unrest, the crime. But there are bad people wherever you go,” says Norma Hingeley, an audience member and 50-year resident of the neighborhood. “We’ve seen so much change in this neighborhood, so much growth. It’s very diverse. Why would I want to live anywhere else?”

Community choirs – with their inherent ability to bridge generational, educational, and social gaps through a shared experience – can be part of that positive change. As the pandemic dies down, more people are looking to connect with one another. 

“You transcend your own boundaries when you arrive at this collective moment,” says Anna Vagle, the director of the St. Joan of Arc Catholic Community volunteer choir in Minneapolis, which has welcomed the Steele family to sing. “Music puts something in our hearts and minds that speaking can’t.”

For Capri Glee!, that has included breaking barriers within its own membership. Veterans say some newcomers were hesitant at first about joining the choir because it meant rehearsing in North Minneapolis.

Paul Irmiter/Courtesy of The Capri

Choir member and neighborhood resident Kevin Jenkins says Capri Glee! helps people find what they have in common.

“Some told me at the beginning, ‘I had a bad experience one time.’ But I told them, ‘That was 30 years ago,’ or ‘That could have happened anywhere,’” says Kevin Jenkins, a choir member and longtime resident of the neighborhood. “This choir has allowed us to think about what we have in common, not what we don’t. It’s about building those relationships and enjoying this time we have on Earth.”

After every rehearsal, the group goes out for dinner. Conversations strike up, as do unlikely friendships. “When I first moved here from out of state, I didn’t have a lot of friends,” says Mary Schrank, a Capri Glee! member since 2017. “This group became my friends – music enthusiasts, like myself, singing and spreading joy.”

Ms. Schrank says Mr. Steele personifies this infectious energy, often telling the choir, “If you sing from the heart, it touches the heart.”

He starts out every season – fall and spring – with what he refers to as “the hymnals”: R&B classics from the 1960s and 1970s that almost everyone knows, like Al Green’s “Let’s Stay Together” and anything by Michael Jackson. He learned to find songs that unite, not divide, while teaching music in East Africa in majority Muslim communities.

“I had to find songs that everyone could relate to,” says Mr. Steele. “Now, I choose inspirational songs. I’m not trying to use [the choir] as a ministry.”

That doesn’t stop him from infusing his teaching with a gospel-like spirit. He can sing soprano, alto, tenor, and bass, and encourages people to sing in different sections. He also tells singers to memorize their songs instead of staring at a piece of paper, and to sing with their hands. “I’m a pro-movement person. Standing still is not an option – unless you want people to notice you,” he says. “You need to connect your heart with your head to become a more expressive singer. More of your soul comes out.”

That is certainly evident at this concert, where the choir is joined onstage by Mr. Steele’s two other choirs, the Mill City Singers and MacPhail Community Youth Choir. Here, they move as one – swaying, shaking, bopping, and grooving in imperfect unison. And then, Mr. Steele’s sister Jearlyn jumps up unexpectedly from the audience to sing a raucous rendition of Etta James’ “Something’s Got a Hold On Me.”

At the end of the song, she takes her seat in the audience. People have pulled out tissues to wipe their eyes. Mr. Steele stands before the crowd and leads everyone in a chant before the choirs launch into their grand finale, “Try Real Love,” composed by Grammy Award-winner Edwin Hawkins and arranged by Mr. Steele.

The choir takes a final bow. Mr. Steele’s arms are up, waving again. “Thank you and God bless you,” he says, as the crowd rises in near-deafening applause. “Go out and change the world!”

Reuters

A soldier sits inside a military vehicle in Yangon, Myanmar.

Dictators worry when young men start to listen to the voices for freedom among the people rather than join the military. For Vladimir Putin, a mass conscription last year to boost troop numbers in Ukraine went so badly the Russian leader appears reluctant to do it again. A similar problem now confronts the military junta in Myanmar two years into a brutal war on pro-democracy forces.

The army in the Southeast Asian nation has shrunk by an estimated half because of problems in recruitment. Among the rank and file, defections and desertions are on the rise. Many fighting-age men now side with the values of the National Unity Government (NUG), a resistance force created after the military ousted an elected government in 2021 and put democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi in prison.

With fewer soldiers on the ground and a massive loss of territory, the regime has resorted to air strikes on NUG forces and civilians. “So far in 2023, Myanmar had the highest number of civilian casualties by airstrike in the world,” claims the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development.

One attack in April killed some 100 people, bringing an unusually strong international response. “All forms of violence must end immediately, particularly the use of force against civilians,” said the head of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Then last Sunday, a convoy of vehicles carrying officials from Singapore and Indonesia came under fire in Myanmar, presumably from pro-regime forces. The convoy was carrying humanitarian aid.

ASEAN leaders – except those from Myanmar – are meeting this week in Indonesia to assess their efforts to end the war and facilitate talks between the junta and the NUG. “The aim is to provide space for the parties to build trust and for the parties to be more open in communicating,” says Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi.

ASEAN’s member states have more autocratic rulers than elected ones, which makes it difficult for the regional bloc to act boldly on Myanmar. Yet as that nation’s fighting force dwindles and atrocities rise, ASEAN may be forced to change tactics. It also recognizes that the pro-democracy forces are better united and organized – and better able to persuade young men not to side with the military.

Some wars are won less with deadly ammunition than with decisive persuasion.