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UNIVERSITY
OF
LIVINGSTONIA
MALAWI,
AFRICA
Excerpt courtesy from The Chronicle Newspaper:
CC, Livingstonia college sign agreement
By Julie M. Graham
Oct. 4 2003 --
Centralia College officials signed an agreement with Livingstonia Technical
College Friday that will lead to curriculum — and some day faculty and student —
exchanges. Joseph Longwe, principal at the Malawi, Africa, school, joined
Centralia College President Jim Walton, Dean of Professional Technical
Instruction Steve Miller, and former college president Henry Kirk, now
University of Livingstonia vice chancellor, in clustering around a table to pen
their signatures on sheets of paper. The hope, the men said, is that the
two schools will develop a strong relationship that builds on current learning
opportunities and opens eyes on both
sides.
"I have come all the way from Africa to see what you are doing," Longwe told
administrators and Tech Prep advisory board members as they met in a college
board room prior to the signing. Livingstonia Technical College is one of
five constituent colleges of the long-awaited but only recently opened
University of Livingstonia in northern Malawi, a country in southeast Africa.
Henry and Jenny Kirk, Chehalis, have spent the past 1-1/2 years helping the
Synod of Livingstonia, part of the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian,
establish the university people have dreamed of for 108 years; it's the third
university in Malawi and formally opened in August. The associate institution, or
"twinning," agreement marks "the deep friendship we are coming into. We will
learn from you, you will learn from us. You have your own way of living.
We have our own way of living," he said, adding that he comes with deep thanks
from the Malawi people and the university commission and students.
The agreement is intended to create international understanding, build a
relationship between the two schools, promote each other in their own countries
and exchange learning opportunities, Walton said.
Following the signing, Longwe toured the college's Henry P. Kirk Library,
computer labs and many of the vocational, professional and technical
departments, such as electronics, nursing, welding, diesel, business marketing,
business technology and criminal justice. He talked with instructors, asked what
students were doing and shared information about Livingstonia programs.
As the relationship between church and state is different in Malawi, Longwe is a
civil servant, but works at an institution owned by the Synod of Livingstonia,
he said.
The country's Ministry of Labor and Industry paid for his plane tickets for
the trip, and asked that while he was here, he explore means for the nation's
six other technical colleges to form such relationships with American schools,
he said. Program information he receives from Centralia College and other
post-secondary institutions he'll tour will also be shared with the other Malawi
schools.
At Centralia College, faculty members, administrators and students will gain
a wider perspective on the world by learning about a new culture and country,
Miller said.
"In America, we think we know everything, but we can learn as well as
teach," he said.
Faculty exchanges are the way that would really happen, as instructors and
students from different cultures have a great deal to learn from one another.
"And the hope is that one day we'll have student exchanges and credits
earned at one institution will apply to the other," Miller said.
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