Community Spotlight: Dr. Mekuria Argaw

11/30/2011 16:00 MST - Dr. Mekuria Argaw, member of the Science Faculty at Addis Ababa University and Country Coordinator of GLOBE in Ethiopia, recognizes the added value of GLOBE in his country's science curriculum. “Currently, we have a new education policy that requires 70 percent of higher education enrollment to be in the science fields,” writes Dr. Argaw. “This is a huge task and requires us to prepare students at the high school level with a solid science background. The standard curriculum promotes more theory than hands-on learning. GLOBE fills this gap and provides an excellent opportunity for students to learn science in a more practical manner.“

Dr. Argaw was appointed GLOBE Country Coordinator in 2007 but it was his experience at the GLOBE Learning Expedition (GLE) in Cape Town, South Africa in 2008 that inspired his resolve to seeing GLOBE succeed in his country. GLEs bring the international GLOBE student community together every three or four years to present their research to an international audience of students, teachers and scientists. During the course of a week, they learn about environmental research being done all over the world by students like themselves; they establish strong friendships and they develop partnerships for future collaborations. Teachers who attend GLEs share innovative ideas and challenges, attend professional development sessions and build connections for research efforts between schools.

At the Cape Town GLE, where more than 500 GLOBE participants from 51 countries came together for a week, Dr. Argaw saw GLOBE at its best –– as a worldwide community united in their commitment to improving environmental awareness and encouraging responsibility for conserving the Earth. He was impressed to see so many high school students conducting high-caliber science research and presenting and defending their results to their peers. He could see that student scientific analysis of environmental phenomenon was having an impact on students’ local communities and he wanted to see the benefit of the GLOBE Program extend into Ethiopia.

In July 2008, within a month of the Cape Town GLE, a national workshop was held in Ethiopia to introduce The GLOBE Program to college directors, school principals, teachers, and officials of the Ministry of Education. Eleven schools were selected to be part of the pioneering effort to implement GLOBE in Ethiopia. The following year, GLOBE Ethiopia hosted the 3^rd GLOBE Africa Annual Meeting in Addis Ababa. This event drew the attention of officials at the Ministry of Education who recognized the value of GLOBE for students throughout the country. Following this meeting, Teacher Training was held to instruct 23 teachers in GLOBE protocols. The Trainers had come from South Africa and Cameroon, and were keen to assist in integrating Ethiopia into the greater GLOBE Africa region.

Following success in the originating schools, including Lucy Academy, three new schools have joined: Ayer Tena Secondary School, Yekatit 12 Secondary School and Mehanialem Secondary School. Three weeks ago a workshop was held at Addis Ababa University for students and teachers of the schools mentioned above. In addition to being trained in data collection and additional protocols, participants joined in the Kilimanjaro Xpedition online to communicate with the student and scientists research team on the mountain in Tanzania.

Participation in GLOBE has conferred an additional and unexpected benefit for Dr. Argaw –– the opportunity to interact with other environmental scientists from around the world. He is currently participating in the Student Climate Research Campaign (SCRC) and he is involved in environmental initiatives in his region outside GLOBE, including his work with The Horn of Africa Regional Environmental Network. “The data that is collected by the schools has a significant spatial and temporal representation to carry out a very good scientific analysis on a certain environmental phenomena. As a University professor, I have witnessed how a scientist can contribute to, and also can benefit from, student research projects. My involvement with GLOBE has given me the chance to interact with other environmental scientists from the GLOBE community. It is this aspect that inspires me to remain committed to The GLOBE Program.“