Should you stay or should you go?
Should people who study in foreign countries bring their knowledge back home to develop their own country, or is it o.k. to search for a job in your new country? Students discussed these and other topics yesterday in Soul Café during the talkshow Educate a man, educate a nation.
Emmanuel Reeves, a student from Liberia, definitely goes back home after finishing his education here. “There’s a need for me back home. I feel an obligation for developing my country”. Maria Lucia Bermudez, who is from Colombia, wants to stay here. “I don’t think it is a brain drain. From the outside, I can see a bigger picture of Colombia, and the network that I build here can also benefit my country eventually”.
Last year, the Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf visited Tilburg University. After speaking to her, a few professors wanted to help to improve education in Africa and started the project Professors for development. In this project, professors transfer knowledge to teachers, give masterclasses to students and supervise PHD-students. To help this project, student David Castaño Estévez presented a crowd funding campaign. He and the other students behind the campaign want to send photographer Henny Boogert from Images Connect with the professors, to visualize what the professors do in developing countries.
