RADFORD – Megan McColley, a 2007 Radford University graduate from Springfield, published a story about her study abroad experience in Africa in the Fall 2007 issue of America Mi Dream, a national magazine sponsored by several business and nonprofit organizations.

This past summer RU reading professor Jennifer Jones, McColley and four other students from the university’s College of Education and Human Development spent four weeks in Malawi in a joint venture with Virginia Tech and North Carolina A & T State University. Before the trip, students worked with community groups, churches, families and friends to obtain books and school supplies. With a 50-pound-per-person luggage limit, each person in the RU group took 30 – 40 pounds of books for Malemia Primary School in Zomba, Malawi, where the group created a library and assisted classroom teachers.

(At right: RU students Megan McColley '07 (center, blue shirt) and Rebekah Sebelius '07 (pink shirt) serve porridge to students at Malemia Primary School in Malawi.
To the left Dave Billie, a parent volunteer at the school, directs the
children.)

McColley writes that despite a paucity of school supplies, “students were always actively engaged in their learning. Day after day, I watched groups of 8 to 10 students patiently sharing a subject book, a pen, and a ruler. The saying ‘survival of the fittest’ did not exist in the school. The children consistently look out for and help each other, so they can all accomplish the tasks they need to.”

Among other challenges, children’s hunger was a major issue. Dinner typically was their one meal a day. Jones says that for a while the school’s teachers had funded, out of their own pockets, a feeding program through which children received porridge at school twice each week. By the time the RU group arrived, the program had ended because the teachers could no longer afford it. When Jones’ students found out, they used donated money from their home communities to re-start the feeding program.

McColley writes, “The money donated was enough to support the program for seven months! We were lucky enough to take part in one week of the program. We watched as many women from the village community happily prepared the porridge over a hot fire for hours. Children patiently lined up by standards with their cups and smiled as the hot porridge was poured into their cups. ... After porridge mornings, the moods of the children seemed to be more cheerful and hopeful than other days at the school. I saw more smiles and heard more singing on those days.”

Jones says her students were overwhelmed by the graciousness, gratitude and generosity of the teachers, children and villagers in Zomba. Before her group left, the school held a farewell ceremony for them, somehow bringing forth an abundance of food and presenting them with traditional skirts they had made for each of them.

For McColley the effect was permanent. She writes, “These children’s spirits have given me a reason to smile everyday since I have been back from my trip to Malawi, the true “warm heart of Africa.”

With a bachelor’s degree in elementary education from RU, McColley is now a graduate student at George Mason University. She is pursuing a master’s degree in education with a concentration in teaching students for whom English is not the first language.