Saturday, May 9, 2009

Culture day - Meeting Meaza


Today we had lunch with the scholarship recipient, Meaza. She's almost finished her first year of her M.Sc degree in Soil Science. She's the only applicant because she's the only female student in her class. She's from the northern part of Ethiopia and it takes 3 days (by car) to return home to visit her family. The Ethiopian education system is very different than the Canadian System. In grade 10 the students wrote an exam that will determine whether or not they can move on to grade 11 and 12, which are university preparatory classes. They can select a few choices of what they want to take in university as well as which university they want to attend. But ultimately, it's up to the government what you end up taking in university. Agriculture was Meaza's second choice, she did her B.Sc in plant science. She's coming with us tomorrow to Wondo Genate (a tourist site an hour away from Awassa). And she's invited us to her house for a traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremony. Meaza is a very ambitious and hard working student. Someday, she would like to do her Ph.D outside of Ethiopia. We to hope to keep in touch with her as she finalizes her research proposal. She's debating between a project that looks at adding pummice as soil amendment or sulfur deficiency in maize.


Dani, Jenn, Melissa, Alexis, Amanda, Michelle

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