David E. Harker

My Trip to Uganda: Day 8 2015-04-24

This is the eighth day of my trip to Uganda to participate in "Encouraging Girls to Study and Major in Science." My final day of presentations.

Event Log:

  • 7:00AM GMT+3 - Left Dan's house for the US Embassy.

  • 9:30AM GMT+3 - Departed the US Embassy for Makerere University.

  • 10:00AM GMT+3 - Arrived at Makerere University Physics Department. We received a tour of the physics labs from Mr. Benon Twinamasiko. I then gave my presentation to about a dozen women. The turnout was smaller than was expected because it was midterms that week and many opted to study instead. I can't really blame them. Despite that, the talk was very well received and there were lots of great questions afterwards.

    • giving presentation

      Giving my presentation at Makerere University.

    • thank you

      Answering questions at Makerere University.


  • 12:00PM GMT+3 - Departed Makerere for the International School of Uganda (ISU). We departed Makerere a little late.

  • 1:40PM GMT+3 - Arrived at ISU late in part due to heavy Friday traffic. Missed lunch and was hustled into their new lab to give my presentation. The group was co-ed and were comprised mostly of members of the robotics club, so I had a lot of questions about the Curiosity rover.

  • 3:00PM-4:00PM GMT+3 - Left the ISU and arrived back at Dan's place in Bugolobi.

Overall Thoughts

Today was a different experience from the other two days. The women at Makerere were graduate level and had some good challenging questions, so it was fun for me to be able to give more indepth answers. The ISU was a multi-cultural co-ed mix of students, so that made it unique already. A few of them were really interested in the Mars Curiosity Rover, and I have to admit they asked some questions I did not have the answer to right off the top of my head! But that is a good feeling to be challenged like that. I am glad they were showing so much interest!