Haiti

Year: 2008-2010

Granting Agency: Higher Education for Development (HED)

Grant #: AEG-A-00-05-0007-00

Grant Amount: $552,000

Location: Port-au-Prince, Haiti

Virginia Tech is partnering with the Ecole Supérieure d’Infotronique d’Haìti in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, to strengthen the school’s computer science program. The three-year project is part of an initiative by USAID’s Higher Education for Development office to build capacity in Haiti’s institutions of higher education. 

The program has two main facets: to enhance the training of faculty at ESIH, and to provide funds that will enable several ESIH students to complete their undergraduate training at Virginia Tech. 

Undergraduate students at Virginia Tech:

The first five students—two women and three men—will transfer into their junior year at Virginia Tech in June, 2008. Under the program, they will complete their final two years of undergraduate study at Virginia Tech and will then return to Haiti to get jobs in the private sector or to become teachers of information technology. The program requires that the students return to Haiti when their undergraduate training is completed. 

Faculty training opportunities:

Virginia Tech’s computer science faculty will travel to Haiti to review and critique course offerings and content at ESIH and to provide faculty there with exposure to current trends in syllabi, reading, outreach and extension materials. The program will also fund four ESIH faculty to come to Virginia Tech for a month to learn how a large American university runs its computer science program. The ESIH faculty will include women; while they are at Virginia Tech, the program will create a speakers series for them to share their experiences working in a historically male field. 

Virginia Tech in the Caribbean:

Virginia Tech already has a program in the Dominican Republic, which with Haiti makes up the island of Hispaniola. With the IT program in Haiti, Tech officials hope to further expand the university’s Caribbean presence.

	ESIH students and faculty members, joining by VT personnel affiliated with the project at the Office of International Research Education and Development; Summer 2008.
	ESIH faculty members (Bernard Venet, Choute Donfred, Patrick Desselien, and Didier Desmangles) attend a session during their training and development trip to Virginia Tech.
	Hervé Jean-Charles (USAID), Patrick Guilbaud, Alex Deprez (USAID) and Patrick Attié at the USAID office in Port-au-Prince, Haiti
	VT-ESIH students, Mario E. Calixte, Sherley Codio, Bernadel Benoit, Jennifer A. Francois, and Fabrice Marcellin working together on a CS problem.
	ESIH faculty member and research Didier Desmangles (l) listens carefully as Dennis Kafura (VT-CS) speaks about ongoing research activities in Virtual reality at VT.
	Marilyn Crane (HED), Patrick Attié, Kim Beisecker, and Patrick Guilbaud visit VT’s Cranwell International Center.
	Don Back, Dennis Kafura, ESIH faculty members Bernard Venet, Didier Desmangles, Choute Donfred, and Patrick Desselien; Patrick Guilbaud at the Office of International Research Education and Development; Summer 2008.

Diversity | Contact OIRED

Office of International Research, Education & Development
The International Affaires Offices (IAO), 526, Prices Fork Road (0378)
Phone: (540) 231-6338 | Fax: (540) 231-2439