Upon entering this project, I saw it more as a nutrition issue that could be solved with logical and mathematical methods. However, through research and world of mouth from the prior team who went to Sierra Leone, there are a lot of cultural factors in place especially when it comes to selling a product. Things such as political aspects, environmental roles, and hierarchy all factor greatly into our project. I very quickly realized how much cultural dimension this project has to it. To begin, females, especially mothers and grandmothers, have a major influential role in terms of deciding what they’re children eat on a regular basis. This cultural issue is something that must be surmounted as we are making products for children ages 2-5. Convincing mothers of the importance and usefulness of our product will be integral to success. Second, a cultural influence that we must keep in mind is the daily economy that exists in Sierra Leone. Therefore, we are making lowering cost of our product a priority to account for this. Lastly, to account for taboos associated with foods, such as bananas, we are limiting how much if any of those we include in our muffins so that these products can be easily incorporated into their normal diets. At home, some of these social situations are very similar. To begin, a child’s diet does highly rely on the approval of the parental influence. Although the daily economy is not common in the U.S for grown adults, such a thing exists with children working for a paycheck or college students with very limited budgets. Lastly, negative associations with certain foods definitely exist in the U.S., especially from a child’s point of view. Any item made with or resembling foods like broccoli or brussel sprouts would never win the approval of children.

Despite these cultural considerations, few of them can be leveraged to address community/ market problems. For example, the popularity of street food and the level of accessibility is something that we can take advantage of to achieve success for our product. Removing the need to travel to a market will be a really attractive feature for our product. Additionally making our products very cheap such as 25 cents will address the market problems and allow for greater purchases. Lastly, the nutrition benefits should allow for community backing of the product.

In regard to our ventures, the African context definitely presents different challenges than the American context. The economy is definitely a major factor, being that Africans base their expenses based off the money they made that day. Contrary to this, Americans can afford to buy more expensive products because they are obtaining larger salaries over larger periods of time. Also, new products in the USA are widely accepted, but in Sierra Leone products need to be widely established and approved. Lastly, transportation is a major struggle in Sierra Leone because of poor infrastructure, however, this is not an issue at all in the US. Although there are different challenges, the African context offers the resources of a large labor force which can be used to sell our products, the street food market which is small in the US, and an abundance of readily grown crops such as sweet potatoes that are integral to our muffins.

All my teenage life, I have suffered through random and burdening migraines. When these migraines started to become a normality, I went to go see Doctor Davis Thomas, a dentist with focus on orofacial pain and migraines. Being able to finally understand the source and pathways of my migraines and my pain was incredibly interesting to me. He was able to solve my mystery of migraines, accessing trigger points on my body and tracking the headaches up to my head. I was so intrigued by the seemingly simple way in which these migraines were explained when they seemed so complex and impossible to understand. My excitement about this prompted me to ask Dr. Thomas if he would allow me to work with him, learning more about dentistry, and helping him with his ongoing research. He was working on a brochure about the anatomy and physiology of the temporomandibular joint and the basics of facial pain for a clinic in India. Reading lots of journals and online publications, I was able to take lead on gathering and organizing the research. Doing everything from researching the correct scientific paper format to searching for easy to understand diagrams, I experienced the real-life research and analysis side of medicine and science. I was able to learn so much information with the knowledge that it would be helping Indians with the same issues I had struggled with myself. It was truly a rewarding experience that solidified my interest in medicine and allowed me to experience gathering research. I would never have known that some of my most painful hours would become the reason I went on to acquiring all this knowledge about the temporomandibular joint and helping in creating an informational brochure for a clinic in India. Although I never really got to see the true results or impact that this brochure made, I was able to connect with people of my ethnicity and hopefully inspired some positive change.  I felt so empowered and glad to have spread knowledge that most Americans are lucky enough to have. Inspired by this experience, as I received an email about the CINQ classes and all the opportunities that lie within them, I knew there was no way I could pass up the ability to cause large impact globally.

In addition to my main motivation to help other people, I really believe that this class, CINQ, and the GSIF will help me. I believe it will solidify my strong interest in bioengineering and provide me with the knowledge of health issues globally. In addition, it will help me understand the needs of the people and how products and ideas need to be more than just good, but that they need to be sustainable, attractive, demanded, manufacturable, etc. In addition, I will learn to use the skills and lessons I’ve been taught in the classroom in a setting other than a four o’clock test or homework assignment. It will force me to think beyond just applying a formula, but apply these ideas to one of the most complicated things in the world: people. Overall, I think an international experience will help me to have a change in perspective of the world and the different issues people face in different areas. Meeting new people and being introduced and surrounded by different cultures will broaden my horizons and help sharpen my communication and people skills.

To address the sunglasses problem in Kenya, not only access to sunglasses is needed, but the proper education and educated individuals are physically needed in Kenya. The correct care cannot be given without optometrists from other nations or areas going to Africa. That initial information and knowledge needs to come from an external source, to begin with at least. At first, care would have to administered, and then hopefully eventually a long term educational program could be implemented for sustainability and long term results. As for the glasses, hopefully a product made with low cost, local, super accessible products, such as wood, could be created. This would stimulate the local economy and provide a low cost solution.

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