Task Force Meeting

November 14, 2003

• News from the campuses
• Off-campus study
• On-campus resources
• Initiatives
• Follow-up activities

Attending: Shiwei Chen (Lake Forest College), Gary De Coker (Earlham College), Robert Entenman (St. Olaf College), Suzanne Gay (Oberlin College), Elizabeth Hayford (Associated Colleges of the Midwest), Robert Moore (Rollins College), Joan O'Mara (Washington and Lee University), Daniel Sack (Associated Colleges of the Midwest), Robert Slagter (Birmingham-Southern College), Michael Schneider (Knox College)

The meeting began with news from the campuses. Bob Moore reported that Rollins is starting to teach Chinese, and will send advanced students to Beijing. Joan O'Mara said that Washington and Lee may cancel its relationship with Kansei Gaidai; the exchange program is not as necessary, since they are getting four-year admitted students from Japan. SARS has had an impact on the campus. Shiwei Chen said that Lake Forest has thirty courses related to East Asia. A recent student trip to Japan was supported by a Freeman grant. Suzanne Gay reported that Oberlin has visiting economists from Japan and China supported by a Freeman grant, and is hoping to have one from Korea. Mike Schneider said that Knox has completed the work done with a grant from the federal Department of Education. It supported a faculty trip to Japan. He added that Japanese enrollments are up at Knox. Gary DeCoker reminded participants that Japan Study offers faculty development opportunities, including upcoming conferences at Ohio Wesleyan and Colorado College. The Japan Study office is hoping to develop a speakers' bureau and share resources. That prompted Elizabeth Hayford to wonder how Global Partners can encourage members to take advantage of current resources, such as Japan Study and ASIANetwork.

Dan Sack then turned the meeting to a discussion of data on off-campus study in the region. Participants noted that Asia seemed a less popular destination than Europe and Britain, perhaps because of language issues. There hasn't been much growth in study in Asia in recent years, despite all the hiring in the field. The number of students has gone up, but they are staying for shorter times. Suzanne noted that China is awash with programs with vastly different qualities, but they serve different purposes. Choosing programs depends on who faculty members know. Elizabeth stated that there was no real need to create new programs; instead she proposed leveraging programs that already exist. Suzanne had concerns about efficiency and quality of programs, because some programs lack depth. She added that students will go where faculty send them, so advising is particularly important. Mike observed that quality was a subjective issue. A participant suggested that the task force could review the most-used programs and identify those most useful for liberal arts students, and then focus on advising students regarding the characteristics of programs and potential outcomes. Elizabeth noted that the quality of off-campus study is more of an issue for China, as we already have a good consortial program in Japan. The task force discussed starting the discussion by getting reactions about current programs from faculty. After that we could perhaps develop a buyers' cooperative with a particularly good program.

The task force then turned to discussing the information about on-campus resources for teaching about East Asia. Participants agreed that collaboration will be particularly important after the Freeman grants expire, so we should plan ahead. We should work to connect and compare across consortial boundaries. Since our colleges have haphazard programs, there are often gaps which collaboration might help fill. We could also collaborate around professional development and access to resources. Suzanne suggested sharing visiting artists and scholars. Elizabeth proposed that the task force strongly encourage Global Partners colleges to join AsiaNetwork, which provides faculty development opportunities, consulting, and networking.

The task force then split into three working groups to pursue three initiatives:

• Off-campus study report (Suzanne Gay, Robert Entenman, Robert Moore, Shiwei Chen) They will look at the current programs offered by third-party providers in China, as well as identifying college-run programs that are open to students from other colleges and closed college-run programs that could be models for others. They will begin by looking at marks of good programs for liberal arts students that might serve different needs.
• Faculty development (Michael Schneider, Robert Slagter, Kay Widdows, Rujie Wang) They hope to create faculty development seminars for non-specialists-following the model of NEH summer seminars-for people from consortial colleges. The goal is increasing the teaching of Asia across the curriculum. Possible topics include: Literature, Art history, Sociology, Natural scientists, and Economics. The task force will identify topics, people, and outside funding, rather than get funding from the Global Partners Project.
• Campus resources (Gary DeCoker, Joan O'Mara) They want to build on the collected information about on-campus resources. Practically, it will help colleges share those resources among themselves. It will also help illustrate trends, for planning use. The information could be useful for both deans and faculty members. The resource list, such as library and art collections, will be fairly static, while the list of faculty (with their expertise) will need to be updated yearly. It could help build the foundation for a speakers' bureau. They will also collect data on language enrollment, number of majors, and number of students going abroad. We will coordinate this effort with the Japan Study office to make sure we aren't duplicating.

The task force then came back together to plan follow-up activities. Someone wondered how these activities and resources could continue after the end of the Global Partners Project. Elizabeth suggested that we could identify specific activities that could be continued with other grant support, and that AsiaNetwork and/or the Japan Study office could maintain the on-campus resources list. The task force tentatively planned to meet again in November 2004, to report on progress.

These minutes were written some time after the meeting. The ideas are accurate, but the attributions might not be.