UMass Amherst Alumni Association

An International Perspective on Egypt

For some fifteen years, Daniel (Doc) Coster ’89 MEd, ’91 MBA has lived and worked in Egypt. A project manager specializing in education, economic, and community development, Coster has traveled throughout the country working on projects. Yet, he was just as surprised as the rest of the world when on January 25, 2011 thousands of Egyptians took to the streets in protest against decades of poverty, unemployment, and government corruption. “I was both amazed and proud of the way the Egyptian population kept their cool and focus,” says Coster.

With a home base in Cairo, Coster has worked primarily with non-profit /non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to improve education quality, especially for young girls. Egypt has made progress in recent years, building schools to make educational opportunities more available in cities, but it is still reliant on NGOs to coordinate and oversee efforts in remote, rural areas, such as Upper Egypt.

“I’ve always thought that civil society in Egypt doesn’t work all that well,” remarks Coster, ”because people don’t collectively take ownership in their community. So for example, the inside of their homes are immaculate and beautiful, but they’ll let garbage accumulate on the streets.” The NGOs are empowering people in remote areas to take ownership of their own day-to-day needs through grass-roots community organizations.

 As to the future of the country, Coster is hopeful. “I’m not concerned about an oppressive fundamentalist government emerging,” he says. “Urban Egypt is a very cosmopolitan place and I don’t think that it’s going to go much in that direction. It will be interesting to see what happens with political parities over these next few months as they begin to emerge. There are a lot of young, educated, and enthused people ready to put good candidates up for positions of authority in the country. I sure hope it continues that way.”

Coster is currently the chief of party with CARE International in Afghanistan. Stationed in Kabul, he oversees a team of project managers working in twenty provinces. “We go into communities with no primary schools to ascertain if they’re interested in getting education to the kids—especially the girls—which in some cases is not their priority. If they agree that both boys and girls will be educated, then we train teachers, provide resources, and set up classrooms. It takes about two monthes to get community classes started... and about two years to get them functioning well.”

Coster has always been interested in international development. After volunteering with the Peace Corps in West Africa in the 80s, he enrolled at UMass Amherst to study at the Center for International Education. To further his understanding of organizational development, he then enrolled in the MBA program at the Isenberg School of Management.

“The international development field grew out of people going in with a good heart and doing whatever they could to help, but without being rigorous in the way they set up organizations or the way they gave advice to governments.  So the rigor of the UMass MBA program was definitely an asset for me,” says Coster.

His advice to others interested in the international development field: live in the country to understand the culture; volunteer or intern with any of the NGOs to better define your area of interest – health, education, human rights, agriculture, economic development… , and be sure to earn a degree or develop skills that can be readily applied into a work situation with a government or developing country.