U.S. Ambassador, Commandant Open New English Language Computer Laboratory at Staff College (11/14/07)

November 14, 2007
No. 51/07

United States Ambassador to Ethiopia Donald Yamamoto and Commandant Brigadier General Migbe Haile today inaugurated a new English language computer lab at the Ethiopian Defense Command and Staff College. 

A grant from the U.S. Department of Defense and U.S. Department of State funded this computer lab and two related audio facilities in Awash Arba.  These three facilities provide state-of-the-art English language learning environments for the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF).  As Ambassador Yamamoto noted at the dedication ceremony, “These learning tools will strengthen the ENDF’s capacity to continue its significant contributions to multilateral coalition efforts, such as UN peacekeeping.”

The new English language computer lab at the Defense Command and Staff College, worth $300,000 (2.7 million Birr) with its Awash Arba affiliates, features the latest language instruction software from the United States Defense Language Institute in San Antonio, Texas, and will allow students to learn English through an interactive, step-by-step method. 

Ethiopians at the Defense Command and Staff College received training on how to operate, maintain, disassemble and reassemble the laboratories to ensure sustainable operation now that the cooperative installation is complete.  The new facilities complement three other facilities installed in cooperation with the U.S. government in 2002 at the Defense Engineering College in Debre Zeit

At the dedication ceremony, Ambassador Yamamoto praised the Computer Lab as another facet of the United States’ positive and growing bilateral relationship with Ethiopia.

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