Alumni Story: Whitney P. Foster '64

I wrote my senior thesis on Nigeria: The Emerging Giant (or something like that). On graduation all I wanted to do was to go to Nigeria, and the Peace Corps became my vehicle for doing just that @ St. Michaels College in Oleh via Ughelli in what was then the Mid West State of Nigeria. For 2 years I was the history teacher, coach (soccer, bball, athletics etc.), and general gadfly breaking old Brit rules of education along with my PC roommate for about 300 mostly quite motivated but poorly "educated" male Nigerian primary school teachers. It was for me (son and grandson of a doctor) a life-changing experience which led to an MA in African Studies @ UCLA ('66-68); running a Fulbright program for 22 California curriculum developers in Ghana (summer '68); Assistant Peace Corps Director in Ghana (68-71); Deputy Peace Corps Director in Morocco (71-73); UNDP dealing with development issues, mainly education in North Africa  (moved to Tunisia '73-'76); UNDP NY as Desk Officer for Egypt and the Yemens ('76-79); Deputy Director, UNDP, in Juba, So. Sudan ('79- 82); on loan from UNDP to the World Bank in DC for North Africa and the Middle East ('82-85); joined the World Bank as the Loan Officer for Rwanda and Burundi ('85-89); World Bank Res Rep. Niger ('89-92); back to DC in late '92 as the Senior Loan Officer for Burkina Faso ('92- 96); consultant on institutional reform in Sub Saharan Africa until my retirement from the Bank in 2000.