Faculty spend spring break in Tanzanian workshop

University Park, Pa. -- Eight Penn State faculty from across the Commonwealth, members of a multidisciplinary working group on indigenous knowledge and development in East Africa, spent spring break in Tanzania meeting with academic counterparts and rural village residents from the Arusha area. Their mission was to initiate a long-term collaboration among Western-trained academics from Penn State and Tanzania and local residents, each of whom brings a unique perspective to quality of life issues related to rural communities and their development.

There was also the expectation that the involvement of University faculty in an East African initiative will promote internationalization of the Penn State curriculum and provide opportunities for students to learn how rural communities in Africa can draw on both local and academic knowledge systems to cope with the challenges of global change.

One member of the working group, Ladislaus Semali, associate professor in the College of Education and director of Penn State's Interinstitutional Consortium for Indigenous Knowledge (ICIK) is currently on sabbatical at Tumaini University in Arusha. Semali is worked with Tanzanian colleagues and local community leaders to identify academic counterparts for each of the Penn State faculty members who were part of the trip to East Africa.

Support for the travel of two Penn State faculty and a supplement to help defer costs incurred by Tumaini University was obtained from the Children Youth and Families Consortium (CYFC) through a proposal submitted in November with Jyotsna Kalavar as principal investigator and Gaylen Bradley, Mala Chinoy and Audrey Maretzki as co-investigators. Additional funding was provided through the California-based Marjorie Grant Whiting Center. The external grant will enable residents of two rural communities to work closely with academics to shape a collaborative research agenda that will be formulated during the visit of the Penn State faculty.

The members of Penn State's delegation to Tanzania are Robert Ackerman, Dickinson School of Law; Gaylen Bradley and Mala Chinoy, College of Medicine; Christine Buzinde, College of Health and Human Development; Maryann Frazier, College of Agricultural Sciences; Marla Jaksch, College of the Liberal Arts; Jyotsna Kalavar, Penn State New Kensington; and Veronica Montecinos, Penn State Greater Allegheny. Travel support, in addition to the CYFC grant, is being provided by academic departments and colleges as well as Penn State International Programs.

"This is a very exciting opportunity for a multidisciplinary group of Penn State faculty to join with their Tanzanian academic counterparts to learn from rural residents how they employ their own community-based knowledge systems to address issues as diverse as poverty, disease, hunger, civil strife, environmental degradation, human health and well-being," said Audrey Maretzki, ICIK co-director. "We are pleased that ICIK's efforts over the past year to create this interdisciplinary working group will enable Penn State faculty to have this experience and we hope a long-term collaboration with communities and institutions in East Africa will result."