John and Abe Return

That’s John Calvin and Abraham Kuyper to y’all. The pros from Calvin College and Kuyper College—Drs. Cheryl Brandsen and Beryl Hugen from Calvin, and Dr. Judi Meerman from Kuyper—returned for a week of intensive work on the Bachelor of Social Work they are tweaking with Monrovia’s Mother Patern College of Health Sciences. From our viewpoint, the trip was extremely valuable. The team helped us clarify and better articulate our program offerings. We better know where we are going and what we will need to get there.

While here, the team visited various sites and places throughout the week. They met with schools, an AIDS treatment facility, an organization that works with young men, a hospital, and other sites where future social workers will be needed and where hopefully we will be able to place our practicum students.

Enjoy the following images—most taken by our visitors.

The team at work. We spent several full days working through and improving the BSW curriculum.

On Saturday, we visited an area called West Point-- concentrated population, high poverty. It is also the home of a very active fishing enterprise.


The fish are delivered from the boats here...

...where some get immediately purchased by the dried fish ladies. Note the load she works with.

Joseph, my Liberian counterpart at MPCHS made sure he grabbed a bunch on the smoker for a quick lunch.


Some of the fish, like these large yellow tail, get purchased to sell in area markets.

Tryin' to make a few Liberian dollars-- these boys are selling palm nuts-- five LD a bunch.

Back to the office: the team meets with the officers of the National Association of Liberian Social Workers.

On Sunday, the Reeds hosted the team at our house. Here Dr. Hugan plays grampa to little "Rae-Rae" Renita Reeves.

Afterwords, we all took a stroll 'round the neighborhood.

On the day before we left, we took a trip to visit another site where we work. On the way back, we stopped to take in some scenery. This is called Blue Lake.

One of the local papers, the Inquirer, gave us this write up.

Weather: The rain slacked off this past week, giving us only a couple inches and some very nice days. With the start of a new week, the rain has returned. It has been raining all day Monday, and we expect a few inches at least. Winds from the west with heavy overcast. Temps today in the upper 70sF.