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Metro Students Help End World Hunger

Stories From the Front: STEM Students participate in Global Youth Institute hosted by the World Food Prize Foundation

Submitted by: Diana Wolterman, OSLN Staff, & Neil Bluel, Metro Early College High School Teacher
Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Metro Early College High School seniors Alyssa Steed and Zakia Nasrin were among exceptional high school students from around the world selected to participate in the three-day Global Youth Institute hosted by the World Food Prize Foundation last week in Des Moines, IA. Alyssa and Zakia competed to win spots to represent the state of Ohio at the Global Youth Institute, where student delegates present papers they have researched and written on a critical aspect of food security, and discuss their findings with international experts and their peers in roundtable discussions. Each discussion group of seven to nine students is led by three distinguished global leaders in science, industry and policy.

The World Food Prize award is considered the “Nobel of Agriculture” and the delegates are given opportunities to interact with Nobel and World Food Prize Laureates. Among the speakers were Bill Gates, Ambassador Kenneth Quinn, and Pascal Lamy (Head of WTO).

By participating in the Global Youth Institute, students are eligible to apply for a prestigious Borlaug-Ruan International Internship, an all-expenses-paid, eight-week hands-on experience, working with world-renowned scientists and policymakers at leading research centers in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. Zakia and Alyssa are waiting to hear if they have been selected to receive the internships.

Here is Zakia’s reflection after the first day:

For my World Food Prize essay, I wrote about Biotechnology, the solution to India’s food crisis. As a delegate from Ohio, I received the chance to attend many of the panel discussions between foreign ministers and ambassadors. Though, I was not able to speak with them personally, their discussions were highly thought promoting. The topics sparked discussions between both the students and professionals at lunch and dinner. I met with experts in their fields like a woman who works with Head Start. I tried to gain resources to bring back to both Metro and for my future. For example, I kept the e-mail of the dietician as a resource for my senior research that deals with nutrition in children. I also kept the contact of a woman who led relief aid in Tanzania. I am hoping to incorporate her project with a service-learning project at Metro. The whole experience so far is difficult to sum up in one word, sentence, or even a paragraph. It has been just as awe inspiring as I had imagined and I am just as motivated to continue in pursuing my career in pediatrics and agriculture. Though I may not be able to end world hunger, but the World Food Prize has motivated me to follow in Dr. Norman Borlaug’s footsteps and join the struggle as a student, citizen, and human being.

Here is Alyssa’s reflection after the first day:

I believe that involvement in the World Food Prize Institute is a commitment to changing the world. There is a thought in my religion that by small and simple things, great things can be brought to fruition. The work of the World Food Prize Founder- Dr. Norman Borlaug- saved many from starvation in the early fifties and sixties in rural farming communities in Mexico. His work earned him the Congressional Gold Medal, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Nobel Prize. This is a man dedicated to helping others and along the way he saved billions of lives. Though we all tend to be daunted by the laundry list of tasks that have to be completed (fighting global warming, fighting poverty, combating world hunger, stopping war…. The list continues) it is good to know that if we all do a little, then together we can do a lot. I am sure that if we all tried to be even half of what the World Food Prize founder was, then we can all save our world.

To learn more about the World Food Prize Foundation and see how you can participate in their many programs, please visit www.worldfoodprize.org.

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