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ADVENTURE |
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MASTER’S INTERNATIONAL
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Essa L. Gross Michigan Technological University Department of Mining and Geological Engineering and Sciences 1400 Townsend Dr. Houghton, MI 49931 (906) 487-2826 |
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That was the question I fielded most last summer…I came here from sunny Arizona in August ’04 to be a student in the Peace Corps Master's International Program (PC/MIP) at Michigan Technological University (MTU). The program, in its first year in the Department of Geological and Mining Engineering and Sciences, fit me como un guante (like a glove). |
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“¿Qué dices, loca? ¡¿Por qué te vas a Upper Peninsula, Michigan?!”
“What! Why are you moving to Upper Peninsula, Michigan??!!” |
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Hey you going my way? |
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I graduated five years ago from the University of Arizona with a bachelor’s in geosciences and since then have worked in electrical geophysics, environmental geology, and as an English teacher in Spain. Two years abroad only made me want to spend two more years abroad (or more??), so I joined the Peace Corps. Then I got word of the program at MTU which combines a master’s degree with the Peace Corps and I knew I had stumbled into un programa da puta madre (something really good). A few meetings with certain profs in the department and past PC/MIP students clinched my vote.
I am tentatively planning on working in Boaco, Nicaragua with the help of my advisor, John Gierke and an MTU engineering enterprise group called Aqua Terra Tech. The community of Boaco is in need of water resource/distribution improvement. According to a recent Peace Corps volunteer serving in, Boaco, the community receives water between one to three times a week, depending on the time of year. In private homes, taps are left open all the time, and when water is heard coming out of them, the days (and/or nights) are interrupted to do laundry, wash dishes, and begin filling every available container in their home for water storage. Originally created to support a population of 10K, the water distribution infrastructure is antiquated and insufficient as the city is now is close to 30K.
Check out the links above! Diviértete! (Have fun!) |
