Ray Vander Zaag

Biography

Ray was raised on a potato farm in south-central Ontario. After graduating from Calvin College (B.Sc. – Biology) and Michigan State University (M.Sc. – Crop and Soil Sciences), he went to work in Haiti with the Christian Reformed World Relief Committee (now World Renew). During the first five years in Haiti, he worked in a rural community development program, supporting local staff and community groups involved in agriculture, reforestation, cooperative, literacy, water, and leadership activities. The next three years he was located in Port-au-Prince as Country Director for CRWRC programs in Haiti. Returning to Canada, he earned an M.A. in International Affairs (Development Studies) and a Ph.D. (Geography) at Carleton University. His dissertation involved 11 months of field research on NGO/local community relations in rural Haiti. Ray then worked for a year for the Canadian International Development Agency as a project officer in the Southeast Asia Regional Program before joining CMU's faculty in 2000.

Research Interest

Ray's interests and approaches to international development are primarily shaped by his NGO work experience in rural Haiti from 1985 to 1993, but also by a short stint working at CIDA and an upbringing on a potato farm. His teaching and research interests are religion, development and faith-based NGOs, rural development in Haiti, and development assistance policy and programming. Ray has been teaching at CMU since 2000, primarily at the Shaftesbury campus but also at Menno Simons College (at the University of Winnipeg campus).