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By Assaf Anyamba, Principal Scientist, GESTAR, and William T. Reach, Associate Director, SOFIA, both members of the USRA Committee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.
As he prepares to move offices as USRA’s work with GESTAR closes, Assaf Anyamba took some time to reflect upon his career and see whether there are some lessons worth sharing in this edition of USRA’s internal employee newsletter, Discovery. We’ll be sad to see Assaf leave, and he ensures that USRA has been “top notch” and indeed the best place ever to work. He saw no barriers being a foreigner and appreciates that USRA is “focused on scientists” and has approachable leadership. The new Earth from Space Institute is a very positive direction for USRA; EfSI could grow to be an even bigger part of USRA enabling funding from other sources in addition to NASA. What follows are some of the highlights from a longer discussion on 12 November 2021.
Growing up in a village in Kenya, Assaf noticed the forests near his village were disappearing over time, and this started his interest in maps describing the natural world, which he pursued in undergraduate studies in cartography and physical geography. An American visiting lecturer showed him early satellite color composite prints, and another visiting Professor on a Fulbright scholarship further revealed to him the larger and rapidly developing field of digital cartography and remote sensing for Earth science that became his passion. The Fulbright motto is “Connecting People. Connecting Nations”, and they seem to have accomplished their goal with Assaf! He was aware it would be problematic to advance the field within Kenya because of lack of computers and supporting infrastructure at the time. (He didn’t touch a computer until moving to the US in 1990.) But this wasn’t the only reason he went to the US for graduate school. Students were suspected of rousing political unrest, and the promising student found himself arrested on the grounds that a Harvard University-sponsored field study program on which he was an intern, at the site of some of the earliest human settlements in northern Kenya, was somehow an attempt to connect with foreign agents. When the state secret police planted Mu'ammar Al-Qadhdhāfī (former Libyan Leader)’s Green Book in his room, and his multiple correspondences with American and European scientists and students from the internship program were confiscated, his prospects at home looked bleak. Having his professor, a white Kenyan of British descent, visit him in prison actually may have made things even worse. After his release a week later, receiving no exoneration or apology, he felt the threat would hang over him and his family, and he applied not only to graduate school but possibly for the rest of his life. What if the efforts by nonprofits and universities to reach out to developing nations had not existed? Is it better to engage, even at the risk of political friction, or to remain isolated? Perhaps he wouldn’t have been suspected of spying, but he also would not have had the opportunity to become the eminent international scientist he is today.
Being in the US was much smoother for Assaf, though discrimination certainly remains. While there was a perceived “hidden barrier” between an African immigrant and African Americans, there was no such distinction for those who only saw the color of his skin. At Ohio University where he went for his masters degree, 15 percent of the student population was international, making for a welcoming environment. The surrounding town was however not so friendly, and there was a definite feeling of not being welcome at pubs in town, especially as the First Gulf War started in 1990. He had support from a professor, who went so far as to write an attestation of support, taking responsibility for him in case there were any trouble. Even more recently as an adult, he got the classic “you’re not from around here” and he and his former German classmate were turned away from lunch at a pub in Parkersburg, West Virginia. And again in Baltimore, he and his family were told to go try a Middle Eastern restaurant around the corner instead of the Italian restaurant he wanted to try. These are the aggressions our people of color experience in society. Being in a supportive environment at work, with a wide range of people who have diverse backgrounds, make a big difference. Assaf wants to extend a special thank you to Ghassem Asrar, who previously managed the NASA Graduate Student Fellowship in Global Change Research that funded Assaf’s doctoral studies. He was pleased to be back together when the latter became a Senior Vice President, Science at USRA. The world is interconnected, and the case can be made that our engagement in it is for the better of all.
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