Dr. Wawa Ngenge, a youth development expert from Cameroon and employee of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), addressed approximately 20 students and faculty members last night in the Terrace Room of Paige Hall.
His lecture, entitled "Youth Development - The Case of Africa, A Personal Odyssey," focused on youth development in the context of Cameroon and his own experiences growing up in the African country.
"Growing up, the condition for progress in life was to make sure I was the best in school," Ngenge said.
Due to tight funds in a household of 12 children, Ngenge said he had to take his education into his own hands throughout his adolescence. He educated himself by procuring scholarships since he was 12 years old.
"Without these scholarships, I probably would have been a coffee farmer," Ngenge said.
Ngenge outlined his own upbringing as an example of conditions still surrounding youth in Cameroon today. "A lot of children in Cameroon today are in a similar position, and not all of them are fortunate enough to do well in school."
As a result of the academic scholarships he received, Ngenge said he had the opportunity to study at the University of Massachussetts at Amherst on a full scholarship. There, he received a Masters in Food and Resource Economics.
Since his education, Ngenge served on the administration of Agriculture for the Cameroon government, where he pushed new agricultural initiatives that would help raise money for local farming families and Cameroonian youth.
"We focused on education, feeding [youth], giving them structured activities to do which would also give their families income," Ngenge said.
According to Ngenge, Cameroon is unlike surrounding African countries because it has become economically self-sufficient.
Ngenge also said that he attributed this development to prolonged periods of civil peace within the country. With the exception of the movement for independence in the 1950s, Cameroon has kept turbulence and violence at bay through a series of government mediated negotiations between rival groups.
Despite the relatively low antagonism within the country, Ngenge said he believes that the country has much to improve on in terms of the welfare of its inhabitants.
Ngenge discussed the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) adopted by the United Nations in 2000 as a basis for comparison. The MDG established several human rights-related goals to be reached throughout the world by the year 2015.
"Pregnancy is still the number one killer of women in West Africa," Ngenge said. "This is something that can be resolved very easily, but there's no will to do it."
Ngenge said he did not approve of the job that the U.N. had done throughout the seven years that he has worked as part of the UNDP.
"I have seen they have great goals that they never achieve," Ngenge said. He said that poor relations between the Cameroonian government and the U.N. have strained efforts to accrue money for human rights initiatives.
But Ngenge said that Cameroon has made progress in other avenues, including the installation of universal electricity. Since efforts began, the government has supplied 75 to 85 percent of the country with
electricity.
Ngenge's lecture was the last in a series of three lectures sponsored by the Institute for Applied Research Youth Development this semester.
Sophomore Jessica Lessing and senior Avantika Taneja worked with Child Development Professor Richard Lerner as part of an independent study project to make the discussion possible.
Taneja said that Ngenge was chosen to speak because he "has the knowledge of the Positive Youth Development (PYD) model and the field experience in Cameroon.
"The overarching theme of our lectures was the PYD model in the international setting," Taneja said.
Senior Gabrielle Eklund, a Child Development major, attended the event to gain exposure to individuals who share her passion for youth development.
"I'm into international studies and youth development," Eklund said. "I'm going into that field and I think learning about various applications is both necessary and interesting."
