Conference focuses on learning from mistakes in international development

Calvin College's seventh-annual, student-run Faith and International
Development Conference (FIDC) is strongly emphasizing dialogue--dialogue around
best practices, when in comes to international development. The conference runs
Thursday through Saturday, February 2-4, and attracts students from colleges
across the country and abroad.

The 2012 conference is themed: Yearning for justice, Learning in love: A
dialogue on fear and hope. Student organizers say that the speakers will talk
about learning from mistakes when it comes to international development.

"We're not just sugarcoating international development," said Sarah Clark, a
senior sociology and international development major who is helping to organize
the conference. "There are mistakes we've made in the past … I want to raise
these issues, not just accept them blindly."

Clark has seen and heard about some of those mistakes firsthand. During her
time at Calvin she has spent time in both Kenya and Thailand. In Kenya, she
recalled the people talking about how a water pump an NGO had provided for
their village wouldn't work for hot water, which was the only clean water they
could obtain with a volcano nearby. And in Thailand, people associated
development with their land being taken away.

"What struck me was the idea of development being questioned," said Clark. "My
idea of development was challenged … I felt conflicted about how faith played
into development."

So Clark and conference co-organizer Jeffrey Bloem are helping provide a venue
for like-minded adults to wrestle with these issues.

The conference features a solid lineup of plenary speakers, including, among
others, Twesigye Jackson Kaguri, the founder of the Nyaka AIDS Orphans Project
in Uganda, which provides free education to children who have lost one or both
parents to AIDS; and Shane Gilbert, founder and executive director of 'Come,
Lets Dance,' a grassroots organization geared toward getting to the root of the
orphan cycle and creating sustainable community development by empowering the
local leaders of the community.

The conference also provides dozens of breakout sessions for attendees to
discuss issues surrounding international development and several opportunities
for spiritual reflection.

For more info and to register for the conference, visit
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/ids/conference
or contact the FIDC office at 616-526-8917.

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Received on Mon Jan 9 09:32:31 2012