Drexel scholars interested in the next version of this course can receive more information about “Drexel Fall Break in Tanzania Culture”
Drexel University’s “Culture and Community Development” course is aptly named because collaborations with five internal and external partners on a computer lab task at the school also led to increased maintenance of school and network infrastructure. And even though the “Drexel Fall Break in Tanzania” Overseas Course (ICA) was itself the first of its kind in many tactics; Preparation for the Fall 2023 course was spread over several years and across three continents. From now on, the impact of the classroom will continue to be felt. in multiple tactics for generations to come.
One of the main goals of the course and upcoming achievements is to collaborate with two cash register organizations to help create a computer lab at a high school in northern Tanzania. This accomplished purpose has had positive effects beyond an advance in virtual literacy and access to educational opportunities for 400 young students. To prepare for the opening of the computer lab, the school got a new paint job and signage, and the district repaired a road leading to the school, which benefited the entire neighborhood. In the release, the district commissioner (the region’s top leader) visited the school for the first time and ended up committing $40,000 for the school to get more resources and improvements.
“It’s amazing to see how everything progresses from the initial brainstorming until the task grew and became much bigger than expected,” said Senior Director of Education Abroad Ahaji Schreffler, who co-taught the course with Shardé Johnson, Executive Director. Drexel Center for Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging and Director of the Center for Black Culture (CBC).
Like all CIA courses, the “Culture and Community Development” course consisted of a few weeks of categories and networking and education before the week’s vacation of that term, which students would then spend living and learning about in the other country. After the trip, the students finished a few sessions of the final course and implemented what they experienced and were informed about a final assignment that combines their local experiences.
“We actually emphasize to academics the joy that everything that we’re talking about in terms of culture and how culture influences progression and network approaches can be implemented right here in Philadelphia, and that’s anything that they can take home that can tell how they interact with their communities, their plans and aspirations,” Schreffler said.
For this course, students came from a variety of disciplines and were encouraged to reflect on the curriculum, culture, and progression of the network through their personal briefings, passions, and/or educational orientations. The final task was an audio-visual task; for example, an elementary in architecture at the Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts and Design focused on the use of local indigenous people and the decolonization of architecture.
Over the course of nine days in Tanzania, the Elegance met with three other tribes (the Rundugai, Maasai and Chagga) to learn more about the network’s progress from other perspectives such as education, fitness, business and sustainability, and how this can help. simply articulated with attention to the traditions and resources available. They also visited and received information from other people running in local cultural, advertising and fitness centres, and went on safari to Tarangire National Park.
“All of the network and tribal visits showed how culture manifests itself in the way other people expand and empower, whether in agriculture, health, education, other business bureaucracies and much more,” Schreffler said.
The visit to Tanzania was not only educational, but also deeply meaningful on a personal level, Schreffler said.
“This is as focused on communities of color as we are and communities of color on the Drexel campus,” Schreffler said. “The program is open to everyone, but the program’s target audience is scholars interested in BIPOC-related topics. “activities, social justice, and student organizations. That’s why we’ve partnered with CBC.
The Tanzanian class consisted of 10 black students and two Latino students, most of whom had never visited Africa before.
“It is deeply meaningful for scholars to be welcomed through Black communities who live on their ancestral lands, who know their traditions and cultural practices that go back many, many years, and who speak their ancestral languages,” Schreffler said.
The promotion was the first ICA to travel to Tanzania, as well as East Africa, and the first to partner with CBC. It was also the first to partner with Drexel’s student organization TechServ, which refurbishes and donates computers and technical assistance and education supplies. virtual literacy and access.
But elegance has also grown and strengthened existing relationships. It was sponsored through Drexel’s Lindy Center for Civic Engagement, which had partnered with other ICAs in the past. And the help and collaboration on the ground became imaginable through MEDLIFE (Medicine, Education and Development to Low Income Families Everywhere), a nonprofit that works with low-income communities in Latin America and Africa. Schreffler had taught a variant of the “Culture and Community Development” course in Ecuador with the help of MEDLIFE; Ten scholars of color participated in this course and made connections with indigenous and Afro-Ecuadorian communities. According to Schreffler, those two ICAs in Ecuador and Tanzania included Dragons from diverse backgrounds, adding foreign scholars and first-generation scholars whose parents were immigrants.
The Drexel cohort also took in the scenery of their journey. Photo courtesy of Ahaji Schreffler.
Tanzania was selected because of MEDLIFE’s presence in the country and Schreffler’s connection to Gloria Anderson, founder and director of the nonprofit Tanzania Enlightenment Development Innovations (TEDI), which aims at virtual literacy and access for Tanzanian youth. Anderson came to Drexel in the summer of 2022 as a component of the State Descomponent’s Mandela Washington Young African Leaders Fellowship Program; Schreffler is the executive director of the Drexel-Mandela program organized through Drexel Global. The idea to collaborate on a course came about after they met at a Mandela Washington Fellowship symposium in South Africa in March 2023.
“These partnerships have been the focal point of all of this, as well as the construction community,” Schreffler said. “It’s a dream to weave all those threads into this program. “
Knowing that the Drexel Group would be founded in northern Tanzania, TEDI worked with local government officials to identify Maringeni High School in Moshi District, Kilimanjaro Region, as a beneficiary of the computer lab. One of the Drexel scholars reached out to the student organization TechServ and TechServ. donated 15 used PCs and provided the mandatory technical assistance to TEDI members for the installation of the laboratory. Dragons also held fundraisers to acquire a RACHEL server loaded with thousands of textbooks and other learning content from around the world for academics to use in the PC lab. . The additional investment helped the TEDI team to train the school and teachers in the use of computers and integrate the generation into their pedagogy. TEDI also helped the school’s academics expand a generation club that would take care of the lab after its opening.
The computer lab was officially opened towards the end of the year and included a luncheon for the Dragons, the 400 young students, educators, network members and local government leaders. The statement made national headlines in Tanzania and Schreffler was quoted in an article in the country’s national newspaper. , Daily News.
Photo courtesy of Ahaji Schreffler.
“This assignment has had a ripple effect that hasn’t happened with other PC labs introduced through TEDI, and I can only think of a handful of times when, as far as I know, Drexel ICAs have been featured in the local press,” Schreffler said.
In addition to physical and monetary innovations at the school, students have since used computers and electronic training resources to prepare for the country’s national exams. According to Schreffler, the good luck rate ranges from 90 to 100 percent.
The next ICA “Culture and Community Development” in Tanzania will take place in September and will offer one or two computer labs. Johnson and Schreffler will continue to teach and collaborate with TEDI, TechServ, MEDLIFE, CBC, and the Lindy Center. The application deadline for the program for scholars is May 1.
Schreffler will once again endorse Drexel’s Mandela Washington Fellowship this summer, continuing a partnership that has welcomed more than 160 young African leaders to campus since 2017. This ICA is the time to be created through a collaboration with a Mandela Washington Scholar alumnus, after the last one of the year’s “Course on Mental Health in Ghana”. Several Drexel universities and professionals have collaborated with fellows through small reciprocal exchange fellowships in selected African countries, joining Cameroon in 2019. Schreffler encourages the university to join and partner with those fellows for ICA or other projects.
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