Harvard Funds Overseas Jobs For OCS-OCL

The Office of Career Services and Off-Campus Learning has received an $11,200 grant from the University Ventures Fund to finance work-learning opportunities abroad, Robert J. Ginn Jr., associate director of the OCS-OCL, said yesterday.

The grant, the largest the University Ventures Fund has granted the OCS-OCL recently, will help establish job opportunities for Harvard students in Africa, India, and South America during the summer, after graduation, or on leave during the school year, Ginn said.

The OCS-OCL provided 150 jobs in Europe for students last year, and is currently attempting to provide jobs in other areas of the world, including the Near and Middle East, he added.

Job Sources

Prospective job sources include Church World Services, Cross-Roads Africa, the Institute of Cultural Affairs in India, and the revitalization of the Harvard-Africa volunteers program, he said.

Harvard Alumni Associations have been helpful in coordinating many programs worldwide, and the OCS-OCL is seeking additional foundation grants to support students doing volunteer work abroad, Ginn said.

He said, "The reason that I am so interested in this program is that students seem to have decided that learning about other cultures in the classroom is not important," and added, "I want to make sure that we are providing students with the opportunity to learn first-hand about the lives and cultures of other people in the world."

President Bok, who was apparently the moving force behind the University grant, could not be reached for comment yesterday.

However, Ginn said. Bok believes the grant should subsidize work rather than study opportunities because so many fellowships for study already exist, and because he believes Americans in work programs overseas will get more integrated in a foreign culture than they would in a study program