Although Boston University Study Abroad terminated its Niger program in December after two semesters on hold, BU officials said they are actively working to set up a new West African site.
Officials collaborated with non-governmental organizations in a safety analysis of Niger and concluded it remains unsafe to send students due to heightened terrorist and al-Qaeda activity, said Bernd Widdig, executive director of Study Abroad.
Study Abroad set plans for a meeting to select a new location in Africa for students to visit, but the discussion has only begun. Officials declined to comment on which countries they are considering until they move forward with their meetings.
Sue Rosenfeld, former resident director of the Niger program, has already traveled in search of the next location.
“I have had meetings in one country already about setting up a program and will visit another country next month,” said Rosenfeld, who was appointed director of BU’s African Programs Initiative after Niger’s program shut down. “The final decision, of course, as to ‘what’s next’ will be made back in Boston by my superiors.”
The program was put on hold on Jan. 11, 2011 after two French citizens were killed after being abducted from a restaurant in Niamey that BU students frequented.
The Peace Corps has officially suspended its program in Niger as well, according to a press release from January 2011.
“We could open [BU’s] program only if we had reassuring, positive evidence that the safety situation has improved,” Widdig said, “but we don’t really have that information.”
The U.S. Department of State maintains its warnings against travelling to Niger, according to an August press release.
“The safety of our students is our highest concern,” Widdig said. “Students have been disappointed, of course, and I understand.”
The BU staff in Niger was laid off this month, Rosenfeld said in an email interview with The Daily Free Press from Niamey.
Timothy Longman, director of the African Studies Center, said the Niger program was unique to BU because not many other schools travel there.
“It’s a blow,” Longman said in a phone interview. “It’s understandable and unfortunate, but it’s still a blow.”
The African Studies Center would like to see a new program in Burkina Faso, Benin or Gambia because they are less well known, Longman said.
“Though we could open something in Senegal because we could do it fairly quickly, it would be good to continue to look for other options,” he said.
BU alumna Carrie Regan said in an email interview she feels “torn up” about the end to the Niger program and said future students will be missing out.
“I have friends who have had great experiences studying in the UK, Italy [and] France . . . but none who have been so utterly transformed by their study abroad experience as the Niger vets who I’ve encountered have been,” Regan, who graduated from College of Communication in 1993, said.
Emily Nolan, who spent two semesters in Niger, said in an email interview BU students could take both French and Wolof, the local language, if they participated in the summer program in Senegal.
“Dakar, the capital city, is much more developed than Niamey, though, and there are a lot more westerners living there, so I think the program would be different,” Nolan, who graduated from College of Arts and Sciences in May 2011, said.
Nolan said she not only felt safe in Niamey, but also thinks the chances of getting attacked are much higher in the U.S.
“It’s really hard to explain to someone who hasn’t been to Niamey that even though
westerners have been kidnapped in Niger, I don’t think BU students would be threatened at all,” she said.
Kelsey Andersen, a senior in CAS, studied abroad in Niger in fall 2010. In an email interview, Andersen said she considered the Niger program unique.
“I don’t think it’s something that could be replicated in another country,” Andersen said.
Andersen who also spent fall 2010 in Niger, said traveling to any foreign country involves risks and Niger seemed similar to other countries in which BU offers a program.
“I believe that in any study abroad program there is a risk of danger, whether you are in BU’s Paris program or BU’s program in Tel Aviv, Israel,” Andersen said.
This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.
This is Paige Buckley and I just want to point out that Kelsey Andersen and I’s school information was switched and none of the quotes I provided were used. I think you may have misquoted Andersen and I. I definitely didn’t say what was attributed to me, and I am sure the last quote is Andersen’s not mine.
As an alumnus of the BU Niger Program, I can only express my regret and frustration at the situation. This is a real tragedy. My semester in Niger affected my life in ways I never would have expected. And, like so many other Niger alumni, I have gone on to achieve unique successes. I would like to express my gratitude to the wise, humble, peaceful and loving people of the Republic of Niger, to the visionary educators who made the program a reality, and to the administrators who maintained such a special program while it was running. All of us who went were very fortunate to have the opportunity, all those who could not and cannot participate will never know what they missed, and I hope and pray for the situation to improve. Irikoy Beri.
The program’s closure is unfortunate. I hope that a new program will be operational soon. Mu ci gaba.
(BUNiger alumnus, 2006-2007)