Fulbright @ Ramapo College

The Fulbright Outreach Lecturing Fund (OLF) provides funding for campuses to virtually host Fulbright Visiting Scholars, already in the United States, for short-term speaking engagements. The OLF award is designed to enrich both institutions and Visiting Scholars through lectures that will promote academic disciplines and cultural understanding. Additionally, the OLF seeks to build relationships and partnerships with institutions that are currently underrepresented within the Fulbright Program as a means to promote future opportunities. These Priority Institutions include: Minority Serving Institutions, Community Colleges, Small Liberal Arts Colleges, Women’s Colleges and Art Colleges, and geographically underrepresented institutions.

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The following are Fulbright OLF programs at Ramapo College:

Wednesday, February 16, 11am, SC-158 (Alumni Lounges)

Speaker: Dr. Masresha Fetene is an Emeritus Professor of Plant Ecophysiology, at Addis Ababa University. He is currently a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Boston University, African Studies Center.

Program Description: African universities are currently grappling with finding transformative pathways that make them relevant, useful and productive. In this effort, incorporating and integrating indigenous knowledge systems has not been sufficiently explored.  African knowledge systems have not been systematically studied. Neither is their value and relevance to current African society examined. This talk presents the nature and problems associated with studying African knowledge systems. In particular, it tackles the broader Africana issue by way of examining the case of the merits, features and stages of the Ethiopian traditional education system. The benefits lost when modern, i.e., Western style education was solely adopted in Ethiopia, disregarding the traditional education system, is discussed. This brief talk recommends that systematically studying African knowledge systems is important for African universities to forge their identity, and to appreciate the continent’s needs and the direction of its social, economic, political, and personal development.

Co-Sponsored: Ramapo’s International Education Center, Ramapo College’s School of Social Sciences & Human Services, Ramapo’s Multicultural Center and Boston University.