BELLINGHAM - A small group of Western Washington University professors will travel to Kenya on Aug. 26 to develop a different kind of "study abroad" course to take students to Africa, where they will apply classroom concepts to help serve the needs of girls orphaned by AIDS.
The goal for this international project is to use service learning to provide international experiences for WWU students and faculty that go beyond the typical study abroad programs; this initial visit by the WWU faculty team will clear the way for a full student-faculty service-learning experience next summer.
Service learning is a way of teaching that uses experiential education in which students apply their academic skills in ways that both enhance their education and foster a sense of civic responsibility. It combines academic instruction with community-based learning by connecting classroom-learning objectives to community service needs.
Traveling to Kenya in August are Timothy Costello, director of the Center for Service Learning at Western, and executive director of the Slum Doctor Programme; Shearlean Duke, associate professor and chair of the Department of Journalism; Kristi Tyran, associate professor of Management, and Mary Sass, assistant professor of Management.
The new international project is being developed in partnership with Bellingham's Slum Doctor Programme, a nonprofit grassroots organization founded to help people impacted by AIDS in Africa by providing food, healthcare and education.
"We are excited and privileged to be invited into a rural Kenyan community to pilot a service-learning-intensive experience for Western students that we believe will challenge almost every aspect of their world view. The Slum Doctor Programme has been working in this village for four years and with the addition of WWU as a partner, hopes to build new and lasting relationships that meet some of the most pressing needs in an area burdened by poverty and AIDS," Costello said.
The group will visit Ombogo Girls' Academy, a boarding school for girls between the ages of 15 and 18. The academy is located in Homa Bay on Lake Victoria in the Rangwe district of Kenya, a region that has the world's highest adolescent birthrates and lowest number of girls enrolled in primary school.
The Ombogo Girls' Academy was developed to improve the status of girls in an area rampant with HIV, gender disparities, and inadequate educational opportunities. Local sponsors through the Slum Doctor Programme provide scholarships for 52 girls - most are orphans - to achieve a high school education. HIV/AIDS has significantly impacted this region; girls orphaned by this epidemic are especially marginalized and are more likely to engage in risky behavior to survive.
The WWU faculty leader of the project is Angela Harwood, a professor of Education. Last summer, Harwood was part of a team that visited the Ombogo Girls' Academy to help set up this international-study program. During that visit, Harwood's team identified academy needs by interviewing more than 130 local community partner stakeholders, and this project is designed to meet needs first defined last summer.
The project is being developed in conjunction with Douglas Nord, director of Western's new Center for International Studies, and also will provide a model that other WWU faculty and students can use to create similar international service-learning projects in other areas of the world.
For more information about the Kenya trip or the service-learning project with Ombogo Girls' Academy, contact Tim Costello at timothy.costello@wwu.edu.
Photos from the trip can be viewed here.