Calvin College Professor Receives Major Grant

Summary: A Calvin College professor of education receives a major grant to support her work in developing schools in Sierra Leone, Africa.

Jo Kuyvenhoven, associate professor of education at Calvin, received a $50,000 planning grant from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Higher Education for Development (HED) to support her work in Sierra Leone. The grant will fund a collaborative planning initiative with Milton Margai College: to develop a tertiary-level teaching of reading syllabus to be implemented in primary schools in that country.

"It is completely thrilling to get this grant. I am deeply glad, less for me than for my educator friends and the school children in Sierra Leone," said Kuyvenhoven. She added, "My co-director, Aske Gbla, said 'Glory be to God' almost a dozen times when I told him. Another partner Dr. J. Abdul Kargbo said, 'They had mercy on a country where education is in tatters.'"

USAID and HED chose 20 paired winners of the Africa-U.S. Higher Education Initiative Planning Grant Competition. Nearly 300 applications were submitted for capacity-building partnerships between U.S. colleges and universities and higher education institutions in Sub-Saharan African nations.

"This competition is an important opportunity to build the kind of higher education capacity critical to the development of Africa," said Joseph Carney, director of USAID's Office of Education.

These paired institutions will use the grants to develop plans to address regional and national economic development priorities. Kuyvenhoven says that this grant will help her further the progress her team has made in Sierra Leone.

"Two years ago I started a pilot study with the help of teachers at a newly established Christian school in Kabala. When I tested the children after one year of school, the results indicated a difference of 600-900 percent between these children and those whose teachers didn't learn about reading and new methods," said Kuyvenhoven.

Dr. Tully Cornick, executive director of HED, which manages the competition, said, "We were elated by the astounding number of highly qualified applications received and even more pleased by how many applications demonstrated a strong understanding of higher education needs in Africa ... The top 20 winners represent the best of these applications ... ."

HED, funded by a cooperative agreement with USAID, was founded by the six major U.S. higher education associations to engage U.S. colleges and universities in international development. For more information about HED and to view details about the planning grants competition, visit www.HEDprogram.com

Contact Johanna Kuyvenhoven at 616-526-7629
Received on Fri Apr 17 09:50:37 2009