After a two week orientation period in Guyana, during which I was introduced to the ways of doing things round these parts, I started working at Guyana's only university. It is located in the rural village of Turkeyen, just outside Georgetown. There is now a second campus (the Berbice campus) just outside New Amsterdam. The official University website is here, though it hasn't been updated for two years.
Working here is certainly different from a UK University. Facilities have improved dramatically in my time here. When I arrived there was no internet access at all and no computers in the Computer Science department! This has changed - and although there are no thumping UNIX machines, at least there are computers available to lecturers. As far as Computer Science goes, there wasn't really the chance (and it wasn't really my job while I was here) to perform or organise any research. Mainly due to the amount of teaching and administrative work that is done here.
The area which has suffered the most from the emigration of talent from the country is education. And strangely this is not just the usual attempts to get to the "West". Trained teachers have mostly been tempted by opportunities in Botswana. The story is one of teachers throughout Guyana (at the time or writing in 2001). This affects the quality of students who make it to University.
AIDS in Botswana, as in so much of Africa, is rampant. It has killed of so many people including teachers, and the result is that the education system was about to fall down. Guyana has a reputation for churning out high quality teachers. In the past many have been tempted to the Caribbean but Botswana has recently stopped allowing volunteer organisations from "white" countries to teach, prefering to keep cultural identity by recruiting heavily from Guyana. In addition, the wages for teachers are far higher in Botswana than in Guyana. What is going to stop someone from going to work abroad for two years in a job that will give them enough money to buy a house in their homeland teaching?
Over the past two years I have met 7 VSO's working at the University, including Dr. Ruth Hawksley, the Maths lecturer I share an office with. Lee, Daphne, Steve, Bruce and Dan have all spent some time at the University as VSO's.
Teaching here as a VSO is mostly great, and certainly rewarding experiance. There are some VSO's who probably could not hold a lecture position at a UK University. A sceptic could justifiably ask – "Well why are you allowed to do this job if you are not qualified?".
The fact is, and this applies to so many other VSO placements is: "The quality of what would be done without you would be so much worse". In the UK there is the luxury of being able to pluck fish from a sea of talent. The developing nation of Guyana has a lack of suitably educated people . Those countries that are being able to stand out, such as India, are those that have invested heavily in education, and been able to keep those trained people in the country.
Lecturing is great fun and hard work at the same time. There is a plus side in the people interaction. However, there is a lot of bureacracy, and coping with the entry levels of students here is a big challenge. Students arrive into University mostly not having A-level qualifications (CXC's which are GCSE equivalents). Not many schools here have computers - so many apply to do Computer Science without having studied anything Computer Science related, with weak Maths skills or thinking that Computer Science consists of using Microsoft Office. There is a significant amount of letting other people do the projects, which only means people fail when it comes to the exam. There are also problems in getting people to acknowledge or meet deadlines. On the flip side there are great talented students here - and they have to cope with less access to resources then are in the UK. The financial constraints many are under - some working while bringing up a family - is immense, and it is only fair to applaud the perserverance in the face of adversity.
Part of my job was to modernise the courses offered by the University, which I managed to do. The Computer Science degree and diploma structure was 10 years old and including nothing about the internet or Object-Oriented Programming. Thanks to support from the Faculty and department the changes were made relatively soon after my arrival. This made the second aspect of my placement - training staff here in new technologies easier. A VSO placement should ideally be sustainable, i.e. the people left behind after you leave should be able to keep going. The success of this does depend on the people as well - there are many cases where resources developed have just been locked in a cupboard after the VSO leaves.
Click to access the Department website. Part of rishistar.org is to provide support for UG student courses as well. If you are a Computer Science student then these pages can be browsed here.
And last but not least I have to thank all those who made working at the University so successful. The Dean - Mr Caesar, and the Head of Department, Dr. Bye were great in pushing through new courses. The Assistant Dean, Esdell for coping so calmly in crises and the paperwork he has to go through. All the secretarial staff who helped out - a big commendation to Carol, Bonita and Shoba in the Department and Faculty offices. Also the Exam office for all their great and hard work - including an incredible amount of thoroughness.
The other Computer Science lecturers - Malcolm, Brian and Robert for working so hard and a special thanks to Lenandlar for his enthusiasm and dedication in training himself in new material. The VSO lecturers for always giving support. And last but not least all those students who were hard-working, made me at home and troubled me in the right ways only! Oh go on then - and all the others too.
If you are interested in applying to work for VSO check out the VSO website. To contact the University about working there check out the University Website