International Projects (an excerpt from the President's Report to Phi Delta Kappa membership November 2018) On November 5-7, I attended the “Reaching Across Borders, Building a Better World” conference in Montreal. The Conference was hosted by Academics Without Borders (AWB) and the Academica Group and was sponsored by a number of organizations including Navitas (international College of Manitoba), SSHRC (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council), IDRC (International Development Research Centre), the Academica Group, UNBC (University of Northern British Columbia), SOS (Students Offering Support) and Fanshawe College. The intent of the conference was to bring academics invested in Internationalization together to reflect, share and network; “resulting in a true exploration of how academics and their institutions can help low and middle-income countries better support their citizens and build their economies” (Greg Moran, Executive Director of AWB). The conference brought together and interesting mix of academics, project coordinators and volunteers from universities and colleges across Canada. Alberta was well represented. I was able to network with people from the U of A, Bow Valley College, U of C, and Lakeland College as well as several Alberta-based employees of Academics without Borders. I hope to follow up with several of these people to see if NorQuest College might be able to learn from their experiences. The conference was also able to secure a pretty impressive line-up of speakers including an opening keynote conversation with Sylvie Freschette, former Deputy Secretary-General of the UN and Chair of CARE international Supervisory Board and Council. Madame Freschette was able to give an historical context and perspective on where we are today in terms of globalism, international partnerships and the shifts back and forth between the interests of the state, the interests of the interests and welfare of individuals and then to the interests of the state again. Other speakers, such as Darcy Rollins (Navitas) and Alan Shepard (Concordia University) tackled the sometimes prickly issues of partnerships, international projects, and the current trend to secure high numbers of international students at Canadian institutions in order to balance the budget on the back of their tuitions. In all, the keynote and plenary sessions proved to be heady, thoughtful explorations about the ethics and continued need for global development, international partnerships, private-public partnerships, and sustained philanthropic funding. There were many different agendas at play and this became very clear as the conference unfolded. Some presentations were little more than shameless promotions for particular colleges, universities or programs. Other presentations explored various options in securing funding and establishing partnerships while still maintaining reputations of high standing. Still other presentations encouraged attendees to seek out opportunities for their faculty and students to have “international experiences” and participate in exchanges of personnel, program development work and training. My favorite presentations were those that provided examples and anecdotes about the challenges and rewards of tackling international projects. I wanted to hear how project coordinators and volunteers solved problems and worked to build lasting and impactful partnerships. Interesting projects… There were many projects that I could learn about, either through the formal presentations or through networking at the mixers and dinners. For the purposes of this article, I will share three. One of the projects that immediately caught my attention was an Academics Without Borders program in Nepal as it was explained to us by Karl Stobbe MD, from the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine at McMaster University.Karl has been involved in supporting The Patan Academy of Health Sciences (PAHS) in Nepal. In Nepal there are very few doctors per capita and most of these are concentrated in the urban centers. As such there is very little in the way of quality health care in the rural regions. After considerable effort and numerous trips to Nepal during the 2000’s, Dr. Stobbe was eventually able to help local Nepalese in setting up a training center for doctors and nurses, the District Hospital Program (DHP), located in the Patan Hospital in Patan, also known as Lalitpur. The aim of the collaboration between PAHS and AWB is to have physicians support the students on rotation in their clinical work and mentor the graduates on effective communication skills. One component of this international work was in bringing over Canadian professionals to help in teaching and supporting aspiring local health care workers. Eventually PAHS plans to include a School of Nursing and a School of Allied Health Sciences to train other healthcare professionals. (see http://www.pahs.edu.np/ ) When I had a chance to discuss this project further with Dr. Stobbe, he shared a couple of the factors that he felt helped to make this project a success. First, there must be clarity about focus and intent. This does not mean rigidly conforming to pre-determined processes or specific outcomes, only that the mission and vision is clear, purposeful and shared. If there is clarity about overall goals, it is easier to make adjustments and respond to challenges. Second, there needs to be an element of stability, especially when it comes to the partners involved. This means that attention should be paid to relationship building and to finding the right partners who might become invested and will work to champion the project at the local level. Too many projects go through challenges when the players change; partners are moved off the project and new people need to be brought up to speed. Often these new participants are not in the project for the long haul, and, over time, it shows. Instead, what the project needs are long-term champions, both in Canada and at the ground level internationally. Karl compared the work he had done in Nepal with some of the other projects he was involved in and said the key difference was in leadership and advocacy by locals who were very much invested and championed the project. Dr. Stobbe shared a video link with me that conveys much of what he believes about establishing quality partnerships and getting involved in international projects for the right reasons: Although the clip is not about the project in Nepal, it does have much to say to anyone considering volunteering in international work. Another project that caught my attention was the Western Heads East Program shared with me by Dr. Melanie Katsivo. The Western Heads East Program is a collaboration between Western staff, students, faculty and African partners using probiotic foods to contribute to health and sustainable development. This program empowers African women by allowing them to become small business owners making and selling yoghurt. It started in Mwanza, Tanzania and has since spread to Kenya and Uganda. The project started over a decade ago and has gone through a number of challenges related to training, government regulations, marketing and support. More can be learned about this program here: https://international.uwo.ca/whe/about_us/whe_program.html In discussing the project with Dr. Katsivo I could hear echoes of what Dr. Stobbe had shared: such a project depends on shared vision, sustained commitment, and long-term champions, both in African and in Canada. Melanie also talked about securing reliable and steady funding. She said that too many projects are short term (three years or less) and that, in many cases, it takes longer than three years just to get going. When projects are driven by tight timelines and are pushed to show hard evidence (data) too early, they are doomed. The locals and the Canadian partners are forced to spend too much time focusing on deadlines and in making compromises in order to meet reporting requirements and are always cognizant of how to “wrap things up”. In many areas of Africa, such projects are only seen as a temporary infusion of cash and energy and are not seen as long term solutions to systemic problems. Commitment to a project needs to be long term, and that necessitates partnerships with organizations that can also provide sustained support and funding. In the case of her project, Melanie’s group was able to establish a partnerships with a number of funding agencies and with a group in the Netherlands that could freeze dry the yoghurt culture so that the women involved might have an easier, safer and more reliable way to produce their wares. I thought Dr. Katisivo’s project was a great example of how to empower and educate through entrepreneurship. These women saw tangible rewards for their efforts in learning how to make a product, market it, and manage a business. A third example of a successful international partnership was the Kangaroo Mother Care model that was shared by Nathalie Charpak. Madame Charpak shared the tremendous success of a program that originated in the South (below the equator) and has now spread to the North (getting use in North America and Europe). Nathalie shared how taking premature babies out of the sterile environment of incubators and having them in regular skin-to-skin contact with their parents or suitable volunteers has shown to be highly successful. The parental contact helps to regulate temperature and respiration and provide an emotional bond vitally important in helping premature babies to thrive. More about the program: http://www.kangaroomothercare.com/home.aspx As the program spread from Columbia, throughout South America and then northward, it was sometimes met with skepticism. Doctors and institutions in the North might dismiss the practice as borne out of necessity – South American hospitals did not have the technology or medicines that health care facilities did in the North. As such, they found a way to make up for this. These professionals from the North had difficulty in accepting that they could actually learn from the South and that Kangaroo Mother Care was actually a better way to care for premature children. As Madame Charpak shared her presentation I again could hear the familiar call for shared vision, commitment, long-term championship, local ownership/ empowerment and secure funding, but I also heard another call: one to acknowledge and validate the expertise and contributions of our foreign partners. All too often projects are designed to the dictates of a Western or Northern agenda. Universities, colleges, and funding agencies are looking to share their learning and promote their reputations by carrying out projects with partners that “could use their help”. Such arrogance and myopia means that, whatever the project plan may say, there isn’t a real partnership. Overall thoughts… This was the first time this conference has been held, and overall, I would say it was successful and informative. The energy and enthusiasm was palpable and the discussions were earnest and solution focused. The conference also raised and started the debate about a number questions:
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Tanzanian Reflections (an excerpt from my President's report to Phi Delta Kappa membership) At the beginning of this calendar year I went to Tanzania as part of a CICan project to work with the faculty at a vocational college in Mwanza. It was my second trip this year to Mwanza, the first was back in April of 2017 when Jeanne Ratzlaff (NorQuest College) and I helped government officials and college staff in developing a curricula for a remedial/upgrading course. The focus on this second trip (January 2018) was on implementing the three week course as a pilot with the intention of eventually rolling out the course to all of the 26 state-sponsored vocational colleges in Tanzania. On this trip I was accompanied by Jackie Bender (Lakeland College) and we had a great time team-teaching with four of the staff from VETA Mwanza. We worked with twenty-six students, ranging in age from 18 – 29 (most were in their mid-twenties). The pilot program focused on four essential subjects: Math, English Communications, Engineering Science and Study Skills. It was an intense but very rewarding experience. The trip to Tanzania gave me an opportunity to step back and make a few observations about the differences between the educational approaches espoused in Canada and those that are favoured in Tanzania. In many ways, a community or country’s orientation to teaching is a reflection of their overall cultural orientation. Here are some of my observations and reflections when comparing Canada to Tanzania. Observations
Reflections In Canada there is less distance between the student and the teacher, especially at the college or university level. In my experiences as an instructor at the University of Alberta, King’s University and NorQuest College, the familiarity between instructors or professors and adult students is very obvious. You are not seen as Professor X or Doctor X but as Ted or Linda. It is quite the opposite in Tanzania where teachers and professors are highly respected and students would never think of addressing them by first names. Or, if they did, it would be as “Teacher Ted” and “Doctor Linda”. This element of respect for elders and superiors is not just something confined to the classroom in Tanzania. They would never think of their political leaders as “Justin” and “Rachel”, in fact, at every hotel, every government office and every office at the college hang two portraits; one of Julius Nyerere (the first president of Tanzania) and one of John Magufuli (the current president). I remember seeing the same kind of thing when I was in elementary school when we had pictures of Queen Elizabeth and Lester Pearson or John Diefenbaker in the classroom. And that shouldn’t come as a surprise. In the 1960’s Canada was not so multi-cultural and modern in its outlook. We were still very much attached to Britain (like Tanzania). But unlike Tanzania, we have moved on from many of our traditionally British attitudes. In Canada, the trend in education for the last thirty years is to promote engagement; asking teachers to make their lessons dynamic, interactive, practical, and varied in approach. The thought is that students will learn more when they are challenged visually, kinesthetically, emotionally, academically, individually, collaboratively, etc. In Tanzania, there is less emphasis on this, although that seems to be changing. In Canada there is also an emphasis on teaching students problem solving, critical thinking, and entrepreneurship. We are to be challenging our students to apply their knowledge and skills. In Tanzania the emphasis is more on conformity and “rightness”. All students should have the essentials and all should be able to give the correct answers when called upon. In Canada we stress student-centered teaching, which includes differentiating educational approaches, providing individualized feedback and working to ensure each child gets their needs met. In Tanzania the focus is more on delivering a set content. The teacher’s role is to show expertise and the student’s role is to show diligence in applying themselves in learning this content. When I was at the World Educational Research Association Annual Conference several years ago I met an educator from Syracuse University in New York State who lamented the fact that so many sessions about education pushed the idea that the teacher is the most important factor in the classroom. We have listened to people like Bob Marzano advocate for skillful technicians who know how to use “best practices” to promote accountability and engagement and ensure academic achievement. But my colleague from New York said that this is bunk. In his mind, the most important factor is the student. What kind of motivation does the student bring to their studies? Just how are they willing to apply themselves? And will they persevere when they encounter academic challenges? I know that my colleague would not advocate for boring lecture-like lessons or educators who fail to consider interactive instructional approaches, but he was concerned that we have put too much stress on the role of modern educators and have made them accountable for what is essentially the student’s responsibility. My friend from Syracuse asked, “In considering individual student needs and in being responsive, could North American educators actually be spending too much time catering to and enabling their learners?” Already there are rumbles in the teaching community that the changes resulting from differentiated instruction; formative assessment (early feedback, second chances, best evidence, etc.); and standards-based, competency assessments have led to “mark inflation” and a lack of rigor. Some might say that today’s students are no longer challenged to do the work to prove themselves to the teacher or to compete against the rest of the pack and that it is actually the teachers who are asked to do the heavy lifting as they work to respond to thirty students rather than one curricula. Now, of course, this is just one man’s perspective. And, as an educator who has been at the forefront of many of the changes to instructional practice here in Alberta that foster student-centered learning (through my work with AISI and in teacher education), I can mount any number of arguments against his position. The fact that so many of our students in Tanzania had difficulty in taking on student-centered, inquiry-type work shows how important it is to build move away from one-size-fits-all content centered approaches. At an AISI conference in 2012 I attended a session from Dr. Yong Zhao who explained that, while many educators in North America look with jealousy to the success that Asian students demonstrate on International assessments in Math and Science, these educators should appreciate what the North American model fosters. He pointed out that the real titans of change, emerge from North America. The “Steve Jobs” of the world, are not successful because they could memorize and reproduce, but because they had critical thinking skills and were not afraid to take calculated chances. So while we looked across the ocean for answers to our falling PISA scores, Asian educators were looking right back at our system to see what they could learn about problem solving and risk taking. Nevertheless, my colleague from Syracuse does raise an important issue. When I was in Mwanza, the students I encountered were hungry to learn. Even though the days were long (8:15 am to 5 pm) the students arrived early and stayed late. These students are quite different from the ones I have encountered in my teaching experiences both k-12 and at the colleges and universities. How do we continue to build learning experiences for our students that will challenge them to be self-motivated, inquiring, critical, skillful, and perseverant?” Lesson Learned While my colleagues and I went to Tanzania to provide some expertise and coaching, we also found ourselves learning many things. If you are interested, I’m sure I could share quite a few with you, if you pay for the beer! Here are three of our most important discoveries:
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AuthorJeff Kuntz Ph.D. ImagesExcept where indicated, images used in the blog posts are personal photos, images from NorQuest College or images from Pixabay. Pixabay is a vibrant community of creatives, sharing copyright free images, videos and music. https://pixabay.com/ Archives
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