Canada Bangladesh learning exchange

Helen Jiang, (seated in photo) is a recent BSN graduate from Vancouver Community College who completed a preceptorship at IUBAT last month with support from an Irving K. Barber BC Scholarship. Helen writes: “My Bangladesh preceptorship allowed me to re-examine who I really am and my core values. The experience also provided an opportunity to strengthen my empathy, leadership and adult-teaching skills. As a senior student, I was blindly trusted by the IUBAT students. Their trust, their leadership, their willingness to learn, and their notion of moving forward as a team motivated me as a role model. Unexpectedly, this Bangladesh trip also assisted me to integrate my own immigrant experience in my interactions with the local students. In short, my Bangladesh learning experience helped me to really understand nursing and caring.”

Rotary Club of Olds supports BHP

The Rotary Club of Olds, Alberta, Canada recently donated $4000 to the Bangladesh Health Project. In this photo, Club President Greg MacIntyre (right) and Publicity Director Mary Turner (2nd from left) are shown with the contribution. We are very grateful for this support from the Rotary members, as well as businesses and the Olds community at large, We have a strong Rotary connection in Bangladesh: Dr. Alimullah Miyan, Vice-Chancellor of IUBAT, has held senior positions in national and local Rotary organizations; local Rotary clubs support the annual polio immunization campaign held on the IUBAT campus. In future, we hope to develop further projects in cooperation with Rotary International. The Rotary Club of Olds describes itself as “FUN . . . with a Purpose.”

Rest assured we will make purposeful use of this generous donation. Thank you.  

Learning global health theory in context

Jen Preston travelled to IUBAT with her husband and daughter in early 2012 to complete her final year practicum for a BSN through Selkirk College/ University of Victoria. She writes, “It is incredible that so many topics I looked into here have tied together: food security, gender issues, breastfeeding, culture, politics and economics. This has been an excellent learning experience. I am finding that while we focus on one seemingly small assignment, endless questions surround each issue. The time that we are here seems to speed up as if we are going to run out of time and not be able to research everything that we observe. I have started to make a list of everything I am interested in, so after this practicum I can continue to explore these issues.”