I-Kiribati student prepares countrymen for med school

Updated July 1, 2010 07:29:41

Technology is playing an important role in training the next generation of doctors in Kiribati - no, there's not a new medical school in Tarawa, medical students are getting their tutorials and
lectures via video online.

It is the brain child of i-Kiribati PHD student Bwarenaba Kautu at the University of Alabama in the US and
his colleague Kalen Berry.

Mr Kautu was the first person in Kiribati to receive a bachelor's degree from the mainland US, and with
his newly-earned Masters of Science degree he lectures in native
language on YouTube to help students before they enter medical school.

Presenter: Geraldine Coutts
Speaker: Bwarenaba Kautu, i-Kiribati PHD student at the University of Alabama

KAUTU: I actually grew up back home and when I was studying in Kiribati I realised that we do not have a lot of resources to teach the students back home current knowledge and biology and provide them with
new information before they go off to study at colleges in foreign
countries. So what I'm trying to do here is to try to help those
students who are very much interested in studying biology, and we're
trying to provide them with the background before they go off to study
biology and medicine, bio-medical sciences at colleges in foreign
countries.

COUTTS: So it's a pre-med course that you're supplying?

KAUTU: Yes it's mostly, what I'm teaching here is mostly molecular biology and genetics, these courses are very important
components of medical school and programs. And we're trying to introduce
the techniques and the knowledge of these subjects in molecular biology
and genetics to try to provide them with strong background before they
begin their medical studies.

COUTTS: Ok so how are you actually doing this? Is it in real time or are you packaging it up and they just
pull it off YouTube?

KAUTU: Yes initially we first started by doing a live lecture through the internet, but then we came across
several problems while we were doing these lectures. And one of the
problems that we faced was the internet connections, because every
minute we get disconnected while we're doing the lecture. So we decided
that we'd record these lectures and upload them on the YouTube video, so
I can just send these links to the students back home and they can just
look then up and study those lectures online.

COUTTS: And if they want any further tutorial backup on that, if they don't understand
what's in one of those online lectures, what do they do then? Can they
get back to you somehow?

KAUTU: Yes, I have all of the emails of the students back home and most of the students that I'm teaching back
home from the United States here are preparing for university studies.
And I have their emails here and they always send me questions through
email if they don't understand these lectures. And the thing that I did
was I tried to translate the lectures into the Kiribati language so they
can understand them better, and then when they have a question they
just email me back and any question about their projects or regarding
the lectures in biology or chemistry.

COUTTS: It's an interesting point, how much of an issue will language be because you're translating
it into Kiribati for them, for the i-Kiribati, but they're going to go
to all English-speaking universities presumably?

KAUTU: Right, right, we have a lot of issues with the English language and that's one
of the barriers that Kiribati students often face while they're
undertaking their students in foreign countries. English is a problem,
so the textbooks that we read back home are written in English, but then
it's better if you translate those words into English, it helps them to
understand better the concept of the subject.

COUTTS: Okay Mr Kautu we're actually out of time so very briefly have you been providing
enough lectures to know whether you've encouraged more i-Kiribati to
take up medicine than previously?

KAUTU: We're still working on that, we try to do this once every year in the fall and we're working on
more lectures now. We'll be uploading more lectures in the fall, coming
up maybe in August or September, and we'll send them back home again
and put them on YouTube.