DukeEngage Cancels Yemen Trip

Security concerns prompt officials to relocate program to Egypt.

Monday, April 21, 2008

Durham, NC -- Due to mounting safety and security concerns, DukeEngage has cancelled its program in Sana’a, Yemen, for summer 2008. The 11 students selected to participate in the program will instead pursue civic engagement activities in Cairo, Egypt.

“One of our primary criteria for developing and sustaining a program site is the shared belief that the program is taking place in a safe and secure area for our students,” said Eric Mlyn, director of DukeEngage and the Duke Center for Civic Engagement. “Given the current conditions in Yemen and, in particular, in Sana’a, the faculty leaders and DukeEngage staff have concluded that we’re not able to send students back to Yemen at this time.”

Sana’a was the location of one of DukeEngage’s pilot programs last summer. There, students developed Arabic language skills while volunteering with NGOs and non-profit organizations to tackle human rights and democracy issues, to work with Somali refugees and to address legal rights of children and women.

Duke faculty members leading the Yemen program have worked diligently in the past few weeks to reconstruct a civic engagement program in Cairo, Egypt, where students will work with NGOs focused on human rights and which work with refugees from Somalia, Sudan and Iraq, Mlyn said. Students also will be in charge of developing and running a summer program teaching English to unaccompanied Somali children to prepare them for fall schooling. Duke student will receive Arabic instruction and will be housed in apartments in the Garden City neighborhood of Cairo. Program dates run from June 9 – Aug. 7.

Site leaders and organizers are Bruce Lawrence, the Nancy and Jeffrey Marcus Humanities Professor of Religion and director of the Duke Islamic Studies Center; Mbaye Lo, instructor in the Duke Islamic Studies Center; and Kelly Jarrett, program director for the Duke Islamic Studies Center.