By Elizabeth KeatingThe Daily Northwestern
As spring approaches, global interest in Africa is hot. Last weekend, the International Youth Volunteerism Summit drew more than 100 students from around the globe together to discuss proposals to improve the world. Some Global Health minors are packing up for spring in South Africa, and many sophomores are preparing for Fall Quarters in the developing world.
No wonder the New York Times 2006 Year In Ideas called Africa “misery chic.” Traveling to an exotic, impoverished country on the other side of the world has become the privileged undergraduate’s new status symbol.
In addition to the Global Health minor, Northwestern offers 15 separate study abroad options to go to Africa for a service/research experience. Although civic-minded intellectuals may be hesitant to admit it, Madonna, Angelina and Bono also helped Africa become en vogue.
The continent provides rich opportunities for medical research, anthropological study and more. Traveling students likely mean well and may have a vested interest in aiding certain regions. But it’s also likely that the attention college students devote to the developing world ignores the home front. America’s problems may not be as exotic as Kenya’s or Cameroon’s, but they’re certainly real.
At least 1.2 million Americans are infected with HIV. In parts of New York City, HIV-positive rates are as high as 38 percent, and 70 percent of the infected are minorities. In Chicago, 22,000 people are living with the virus.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 46.6 million Americans were uninsured in 2005. Last weekend, 13 governors, including Rod Blagojevich of Illinois, raised concern about their ability to provide health insurance to high-risk children. Coverage for the insured is limited annually due to a dangerous cocktail of wary medical practitioners and an insurance bureaucracy.
Our education system is in crisis, with only 35 percent of high school seniors reading proficiently in 2005. While popular domestic programs like Teach For America help a small portion of the disadvantaged, these same children often must overcome difficult environmental factors. Larger efforts are needed to provide them with clean water, a healthy diet and immunizations – needs not so far from those of their African counterparts.
These problems are furthering inequality in America and leaving us far behind our global competitors.
There are no easy answers, but hopeful examples can be seen through the actions of grassroots campus groups like Oasis, Northwestern Community Development Corps, Dance Marathon and Alternative Student Breaks.
More university students need to turn their training inward to help communities at home. Collegiate global health curriculums and service are vital and effective, but many miss the point. Only with more healthy, educated and advantaged Americans can we focus our attention on the world’s greater dilemmas.
Medill junior Elizabeth Keating can be reached at [email protected].
