University Partnership For Disaster Risk Management In Ethiopia
Empowering a generation of disaster response experts
July 2007
Higher Education for Development (HED), in cooperation with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID/Ethiopia) awarded the University of Arizona (UA), Bureau of Applied Research in Anthropology (BARA) and Bahir Dar University in collaboration with Ferguson Lynch funds to create an online graduate program in Disaster Science at Bahir Dar University in Ethiopia. The ultimate goal of the program was to build capacity to establish a disaster response center in the Horn of Africa to strengthen the response to frequent earthquakes, floods, and famines occurring across the region.
The US Higher Education in Development Agency(HED) with USAID funded a five-year plan with the objective of creating a program that would empower and train local first responders to run the center. With their partners selected and a mission at hand, Ferguson Lynch was tasked with creating the technology to bring the program to life.
Ferguson Lynch worked with professors from the University of Arizona and Bahir Dar to secure approvals from the president of Bahir Dar university in order to implement the curriculum online and on campus. After researching the Ethiopian governments Information Technology strategic plans and with approvals from Bahir Dar University, Ferguson Lynch designed a bespoke technological system that could support a combination of face-to-face instruction and distance learning. Bahir Dar University’s low-bandwidth internet, intermittent electricity, and students, adult learners, who were working in remote areas in Ethiopia would have disrupted access to research materials and consulting professors using standard methods. Ferguson Lynch designed a custom solution to overcome these challenges. They worked with campus personnel to create a computer lab and docking station on campus. Ferguson Lynch made several trips to Ethiopia to install the needed hardware with preloaded learning management system software and worked with the CIO to connect the online program server to Bahir Dar university’s local intranet.
This coordination and cooperation helped establish and sustain a local Knowledge Management System (KMS)—an online library to store course lessons, and research materials for both professors and students at the university. Students were able to access courses remotely online and/or connect to their lessons and course materials at Bahir Dar University via the local area network when possible.
The program eventually supported a lab support staffer, and a University of Arizona doctorate student who manned the on-campus lab and supported students, local BDU professors, and University of Arizona professors who made trips to Bahir Dar during the semester.
By embracing and building upon the real-world limitations of this project’s location, Ferguson Lynch executed HED’s and USAID’s vision to empower those living in disaster-vulnerable areas to become leaders in disaster relief. Together, the University of Arizona, Ferguson Lynch, and partners built a program that outlasted HED’s and USAID’s initial five-year plan, furthered the study of disaster science at Bahir Dar, and created a KMS that is still used as a “gateway to knowledge” for the students of Bahir Dar.