Reflections from CGIU 2012: Service, commitment, and community
Posted by Jill Shah on April 3, 2012
Written by: Alyssa Smaldino, Program Director, GlobeMed
What Usher and Madeleine Albright have in common
If you had asked me three days ago what Usher and Madeleine Albright had in common, my only response would have been “they both know how to work the stage”. I saw Usher work it in Pittsburgh when I was fifteen, and I was star-struck and speechless. Two years ago, as a junior at George Washington University (GWU), I saw Madeleine Albright work the stage on a panel with the four most recent Secretaries of State. I was star-struck and speechless. I never would have thought that they were similar in any other way. I was wrong.
This weekend I had the privilege of attending the fifth annual Clinton Global Initiative University (CGI U) with 7 other members of GlobeMed’s National Office staff, 22 GlobeMed chapter members from five different chapters, and 1 member of GlobeMed at GWU’s partner organization, the Rwanda Village Concept Project (RVCP). The Meeting opened Friday night with a panel moderated by President Clinton, including panelists Madeleine Albright, Steven Knapp, Rye Barcott, Sadiqa Saleem, and Usher Raymond IV. What do all of these individuals have in common?
The panel was titled “The Power of Public Service”. All of the panelists showed a deep, humble commitment to public service, although this trait came out in very different ways for each of them. From defying the Afghani government by building all-female universities to mentoring inner-city youth in America, these panelists all demonstrated a desire to understand and improve the human condition. They saw the good in humankind and they sought to strengthen it in any way they can. This is not only what connects them to one another, but to all of us.
Spotlight: GlobeMed at GWU’s Commitments to Action
This year, three GlobeMed chapters had a total of four Commitments selected to be featured at CGI U 2012. GlobeMed at GWU, of which I was a part of for nearly four years, had two wonderful Commitments selected. The first, a Maternal Health Education Program in Southern Rwanda, is in its third year and has also been recognized by Ashoka Changemakers as a transformational project that not only provides education but is also a source of nutrition and income to the poorest mothers in the Huye District.
The second focuses on enhancement of the Huye Health Clinic that has been refurbished by GlobeMed at GWU and Rwanda Village Concept Project over the past five years. Together, these projects provide a holistic approach to improved quality of life for some of the poorest communities in the country of Rwanda.
On community and your sense of self
I was truly impressed by all of the Commitments submitted by GlobeMed and other students from around the world. When GlobeMed’s Executive Director, Maya Cohen, and the former Coordinator of RVCP, Vincent Ndebwanimana, spoke on a panel Saturday morning, they spoke about global health as the connector of young people around the world. They were absolutely right--health is what connects us and what allows us to turn our passions into action. I believe GlobeMed provides an outlet for reflection in a community of people who are all committed to action.
Daphni Leef, a leading activist of the Israeli Tent Movement, challenged the audience to “make your sense of self specific to yourself”. I don’t think I could end with a better piece of advice. Find out who you are, what you love, and do it. This weekend proved to me that everybody has the ability to make change; those who do are those who never question that ability.
Spotlight on globalhealthU: GlobeMed at BC, GlobeMed at MIT, and network-wide poverty-health cycles
Posted by Jill Shah on April 3, 2012
Check out some highlights from the thoughtful and creative work that chapters have been doing in globalhealthU all year long:
Poverty-health cycles
This year’s theme of the globalhealthU curriculum looks at how poverty relates to health. Chapters discussed the intrinsic relationship between the two and created a visual representation of the poverty-health cycle based on their chapter discussions. Check out these beautiful photos of their representations.
GlobeMed at BC: A case study in post-earthquake rebuilding
In the globalhealthU curriculum, students study six developmental economists with different views on the root cause of poverty and a different suggested method to combat poverty. Chapters held discussions or debates about the economists to open a dialogue on the varying opinions.
GlobeMed at Boston College tied together chapter members’ voices, their partner organization, and the opinions of the economists into a unique case study. They looked at Ayacucho, Peru (a city with a 72.5% poverty rate), which has been hit by an earthquake. The ghU coordinators, Sahil Angelo and Debi Lipman, created a case study in which the people of Ayacucho were too impoverished to bring themselves out of disaster and the Peruvian government was not motivated to help the people of Ayacucho.
They provided their chapter with a goal:
We need to rebuild the community in terms of infrastructure (water, roads, electricity etc), jump start the economy, and address the health needs of the people suffering. The only question that remains is “how.” Create a solution and present it to the GlobeMed chapter. Remember the relationships between international and national politics, international aid/NGOs and institutions, how they interact, and how they may support/conflict each other.
As a chapter, BC proposed a solution that implemented partnerships within the community (similar to GlobeMed’s own partners!) to raise Ayacucho out of poverty. Boston College’s supplemental case study resulted in “the best ghU yet!”
Check out the full case study!
GlobeMed at MIT: World Day of Social Justice newsletter
MIT started a monthly globalhealthU newsletter for chapter members and MIT students. Written by globalhealthU Coordinators Emma Broderick and Danielle Class, it showcases different global health issues, profiles chapters in the network, and describes a local global health organization.
February’s newsletter gave the history of the World Day of Social Justice and current issues surrounding social justice.
This newsletter profiled Oberlin (LGBT Rights), MIT, George Washington University, Whitman College (Women’s Rights), and Boston College (Labor Rights) as examples of the different areas of social justice that GlobeMed promotes.
In addition, they informed students on world news with “Global Health Update” and brought in their community through the “Local Organization Spotlight.”
Check out the GlobeMed at MIT newsletter here!
These are just three great examples of globalhealthU happenings at 46 chapters all year long! E-mail for more information about our educational program or the going-ons at chapters.
Next Week: M&E Panel and National Public Health Week
Posted by Roshni Bhatnagar on March 30, 2012
Image from http://www.nphw.org
Next week is GHDonline’s Monitoring and Evaluation Expert Panel and National Public Health Week. Both are sure to be very interesting so check them out!
More about the M&E Panel:
The five experts on the panel are Dr. Pierre Barker of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, Dr. Paulin Basinga of the National University of Rwanda School of Public Health, Dr. Lisa Hirschhorn of Partners in Health, Dr. Wesler Lambert of Zanmi Lasante in Haiti, and Dr. Kenny Sherr of the Department of Global Health at the University of Washington and Health Alliance International. Panelists will be addressing the need for evaluation and monitoring to use data to improve programs. They will also discuss successful M&E strategies in the context of healthcare delivery and health systems, the major pitfalls in M&E data collection and how to overcome them, and building internal capacity for implementing M&E.
Find out more about the panel and how to sign up on the GHD website!
More about National Public Health Week:
National Public Health Week is from April 2-April 8 this year. The week aims to encourage people and their communities to take small actions toward preventing illnesses and improving their lives. Healthy living must be a lifestyle rather than a reaction to health problems. Here’s the day-by-day breakdown of the week:
Monday: A healthier America begins with active living and healthy eating — Promote healthy choices in your communities, such as bike lanes and farmer’s markets.
Tuesday: A healthier America begins with living tobacco- and drug-free and preventing alcohol abuse — Identify alcohol and drug use disorders early to reduce high-risk alcohol and drug consumption.
Wednesday: A healthier America begins with preventing communicable diseases — Encourage proper hand-washing and food preparation habits.
Thursday: A healthier America begins with reproductive and sexual health — Practice safe sex, encourage responsible contraception behavior and promote access to preventive health services.
Friday: A healthier America begins with mental and emotional well-being — Refer people with signs of depression and suicidal thinking to appropriate resources and help centers.
Friday April 6 is also student day, so enter the video contest or join the discussion online. To learn more about National Public Health Week, check out their website.
Because you’re a student
Posted by Jill Shah on March 29, 2012
What’s special and powerful about a social movement driven by students?
In this podcast in the Journal of Global Health, Maya Cohen, Executive Director of GlobeMed, and Nicole Dussault, GlobeMed at Columbia, weigh in on why students are uniquely positioned to drive social change.
"[What] I think GlobeMed students do best is that they connect the margins of the world. Think about walking through Butler library and you pool resources and wealth and knowledge that’s captured in that space. You know that is an extreme; it’s an extreme in the world, in terms of its richness of resources. And then if you think about the places where students are studying abroad, where GlobeMed students are traveling to on their summer internships, whether it’s Lesotho or Cambodia or inner city Peru in Lima, they’re traveling to places that really have some of the greatest depravity of resources.
And they’re moving back and forth between those two margins and they have the time and the resources to travel between them and they have the vision of imagining how you could actually connect those two such that it would lessen the inequality of the world.. [They] have the guts, the chutzpah, the pragmatic idealism to think about how you actually bring those two together.”
Or, read a transcript of the podcast.
