east africa – Houghton STAR

By Jennifer Page

The last cohort of Houghton University’s East Africa Program returned to campus this fall disappointed in the program’s cancellation and hungry for answers.

Since 1998, the East Africa Program has impacted the lives of Houghton students by offering them the opportunity to experience a culture vastly different from their own.

Dr. Eli Knapp, professor of biology and director of Houghton’s East Africa Program since 2013, explained that the program offered a holistic approach to education where students and professors experienced life together, which allows relational opportunities a traditional classroom does not.

Knapp participated in the program in 1999 and has a firsthand understanding of its effect on students and their education.

“I came alive as a student on the program,” he said.“Normal classes were fine, but I didn’t realize there was a higher plateau I could reach. Seeing lions on a kill in my Wildlife Behavior course was different from hearing a professor talk about it or reading about it in a textbook. I wanted to perpetuate that model of experiential learning.”

This type of experiential learning helped students recognize how the lessons they were taught influenced their lives outside of the classroom.

“The program forced me to grow as a student and as a person, which is something my normal classes haven’t done,” said junior Kayleigh Verspoor. “It also forced me to challenge the beliefs I already had in place and find something deeper and more authentic. I really miss my time in Kenya.”

When asked how she felt about the program’s cancellation, Verspoor said, “I’m deeply saddened. I think it takes away life-changing opportunities for students.”

Verspoor isn’t the only one who thinks this. Senior Nina D’Amato, Verspoor’s cohort mate, said, “It seems like [the program] had such an abrupt ending without reason. I think we’re all hungry for those answers.”

But those answers are hard to come by.

Dr. Paul Young, who served as provost during the 2020-2021 academic year, gave his answer to the program’s cancellation by saying, “In earlier years of the program, the program budget benefited from enrolling several students from other colleges each year. As the numbers of students enrolling decreased, the overall budget became more difficult to balance.”

In early 2021, Knapp received news of the program’s termination.

“For the sake of our students, the decision to end such a successful, long-running, and life-changing program saddened me,” Knapp said. “But a university has to be wise with its resources and I understand the reality of financial constraints. We had something unique and special, and I did want one last year to do it. So I was really grateful for that chance.”

Knapp ended up appealing the decision, and Dr. Shirley Mullen, Houghton’s president at the time, approved one final year of the program.

Now that Dr. Mullen has moved on from Houghton, however, the cohort may not get the answers they are looking for. When speaking to David Davies, Houghton’s current Provost, he explained that a lot of economic and COVID-19-related factors may have played a part in the decision. “But it was ultimately President Mullen’s decision.”

He also stated that Houghton’s commitment to international experiences has not changed and that he does not want to see those opportunities go away for students. If Houghton could find a way to run the program sustainably, like running it on a four-year cycle, he is open to it.

“If we want to have international experiences for students, it makes sense to build off of the relations we already have. It makes more sense than starting a whole new program,” Davies said. “That’s a conversation worth having for sure.”

Houghton may not have seen the last of the East Africa Program, but for now, there are no concrete plans for Houghton students to return.

“It was going on for twenty years,” Knapp said. “It changed lives, it changed my life. It really is the death of something, but as I like to remind my biology students, the death of one thing may be the birth—or rebirth—of something else.”★

A book review ought to start, more than likely, with the book. But my review can’t begin there. It begins with the man. The man who wrote the book, who gathered days and moments, adventures and seasons, who recalled and reminisced and turned memories to words, to pages, to chapters, to book: a collection of short stories bound in Where Antelope Roam.

Photo Courtesy of: Amazon.com

I cannot separate the book from the man; but then, I don’t need to. This is autobiography—what makes the book worth reading is the man who lives a life worth reading. I vouch for the value of both.

I begin, however, with the author. An author I first knew as a professor.

With an energy and eagerness (either endearing or embarrassing) of my college freshman self, I sat in his Cultural Anthropology classroom. Before the end of his two hour class, I remember clearly thinking “I want to do what he does.” Now this, I’m coming to learn, has less to do with the specifics of doing—with mimicking job or education or, not to give too much away, the handling of horned vipers—but the being. And this is harder to articulate and harder to enact.

What I sensed in that classroom, and what I sense in the pages of this book, is this fullness of life. A character and a being, a posturing, that is wonderful—that is, really, full of wonder. It is this unwavering joy in life—a firm confidence in the value of here: this place, this person, this landscape and moment before me. It is this seeking and spotting of goodness that is wholly refreshing and inspiring. It is wise. In being lost, in carrying out difficult work in a sometimes difficult climate and context, in childhood and career and aging, in adventure and misadventure, there is a lightheartedness and there is always learning.

This is an incredible life and these are incredible stories about a person and a place, beloved. Africa, a continent so often stereotyped or skewed, is given life and image through Arensen’s stories: it is spectacularly beautiful and complex. much like the people that we are, like the lives we live, and the countries and continents we inhabit. This is a life and a continent that cannot be painted with a broad stroke. And it isn’t. Arensen’s stories, instead, are threaded with themes of humour, culture, spirituality, sorrow, knowledge, and wisdom.

This anthology, these stories, provides snippets and snapshots of a patchwork life, colourful, pieces unique and wonderful, each with a pattern and shade of their own.

My sophomore self, with a slightly more subtle enthusiasm, did end up doing what he did (or at least one of the things he did—it was a start). I signed up for his study-abroad program, a program he founded and directed for many years, in Tanzania. And on our first full day, he shared with his cohort of students this Anglican catechism: “What is the chief end of man? To glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” This is something Arensen, and his book, embodies. And it is this I hope to do—and be.

This is a book you ought to read, and a man you ought to know.

Rachel Woodworth is a Class of 2015 Houghton Alum.