During the Summer of '08 I was awarded a $15,000 scholarship to live and work in Dakar, Senegal for the Goree Institute. It was the first attempted program, and I was picked due mainly to my experience in web design.

It is difficult in few words to explain my entire experience working at the Goree Institute in Dakar, Senegal. A successfull failure is about the closest thing that comes to defining it. My work, initially, was to update the Institute's web presence and implement a CRM to ensure consistent, updated content. Unfortunately, upon arrival, it was learned that the Institute had already contracted out the design and part of that design was the implementation of the CMS Joomla!. Depsite this, however, I decided to perform a user needs assessment to determine what the employees at the Institute were most looking for in the Institute's web site. While I was unable to implement many of these ideas beyond basic sketches due to circumstances beyond my control, I did learn a lot about designing across cultures and working in a foreign envrionment. In picture 1/3 you will see my proposed changes to the design created by the Senegalese design firm. Picture 2/3 are my comments/critiques of the design firms proposed design. Picture 3/3 is a screenshot of my first report.

For a somewhat lengthy overview and analysis of my work with the Goree Institute, you can read Goree Institute Internship Summer 2008: Reflection and Analysis.