Working at the National University of Rwanda

I walked to school on Monday for the first time. It takes me about 50 minutes to walk from home and it's about 75% up hill. While it's not exactly the way I like to start my day at 7am, I figure it will be good training for my field work up in the mountains of Nyungwe. I started work at the National University of Rwanda (I just call it NUR) on Monday. It's an interesting place but has baffling bureaucracy. It seems that the government recently changed the scholarship system for its' undergraduate students. Previously, everyone received scholarships- starting this academic year (Jan 1) only the poorest students receive them. The result I'm told, is that the vast majority of students have not shown up for classes which were meant to have started this week. I'm told that most students can't afford university without the scholarships. It's unclear what will happen. The professors seem to think that the students will be able to collect money from their families and eventually attend- maybe in a week or two weeks time.

I'm lucky because I am teaching graduate level students who are not affected by this scholarship rule. I start my first lecture on Friday afternoon. Because my students are all working- mostly as civil servants, I teach 3 hours on Friday and another 5-6 hours on Saturday. I was given the option of breaking it up over Fri, Sat, and Sun, but I decided I need one day off! I've been working really hard trying to put together 8 hours of lecture material for this first week's meeting. It is like cramming the equivalent of three weeks of material into a weekend! And for a class I have not taught before (Wildlife Ecology & Management). While I'm nervous about what the class will be like (I'm told the student's written and oral English is not the best), it's exciting to be holding the very first class of a brand new (first ever in Rwanda) Masters program in Conservation Biology! We are having a small party to celebrate the beginning of the program tomorrow night.