Central Europe & Russia Task Force

Notes of the Meeting on September 30, 2005

• Symposium
• Travel grants
• International visitors
• Reviewing six years of work
• State of engagement
• Next steps

Meeting held: September 30, 2005 from 11:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. at the office of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest, Chicago, Illinois

Participants: Uliana Gabara (University of Richmond), Gitta Hammarberg (Macalester), Thomas Newlin (Oberlin), Daniel Sack (ACM), Barclay Ward (University of the South), Larry White (Beloit)

Dan started by saying that the meeting had three main agenda items: To review what the task force had done in the past year, review what it had done in the past six years, identifying what it had learned, and discuss possible follow-up. The most important activity of the past year was the symposium, held at the University of Richmond in April. It attracted about forty-five people, including seminar alumni, travel grant recipients, and some new to the project's activities. The group was not quite as large as we anticipated, but it made for good discussions. Dan noted that the evaluations were generally positive-except for transportation issues. Some participants felt rushed, and others felt that the breakouts may not have been as effective as we desired. Larry noted that there were two groups at the conference-area specialists and everyone else-with different agendas. The first group was worried about the state of the field, while the second group was more focused on ways to connect with the region. Barclay replied that this reflects the task force's intentional strategy, to get both specialists and non-specialists involved. Larry stated that the symposium did not really meet the needs of the second group. Gitta felt that the breakouts were not effective, but it was good to hear about specific projects, including new courses, that came out of the grants and seminars. She wondered if we could collect new course syllabi on a common web site. Uliana said that such a collection would probably need to be password protected.

Dan also reported that the last round of travel grants was successful. We received thirty-three proposals; when the selection subcommittee (Todd Armstrong, Martin Farrell, and Larry Penrose) read them they decided to fund them all. It was a nice mixture of veterans and new applicants, Dan noted, with a range of disciplines and destinations. Many are building connections with people in the region. A number of recipients were planning to develop off-campus experiences for students. Early reports suggest that people had generally positive experiences.

The international visitors program has also had real benefits for the colleges, Dan said. Post-visit reports show that there has been real impact, but it's not clear whether they will result in longer-term relationships or curricular impact. Task force members agreed that some of the visits have had more impact than others. Dan has been impressed by how these visits have been shared-often through networks developed by people who had gone on seminars together. The main challenges have been visas in some cases, especially for colleges not used to dealing with them. We have had nothing to do with that process. At a recent ACM meeting someone suggested creating a web-based calendar where colleges could post names of international visitors whose visits could be shared. Uliana said that email announcements would be preferable and easier to manage.

The agenda shifted to the second item--reviewing the project's six years of work--as Dan reported that in that time the task force has:

• Sent 56 faculty (plus 5 facilitators) on four seminars, two in Russia, two in Central Europe
• Awarded 92 travel grants totaling $202,107
• Supported the visits of 33 artists or scholars from the region to 45 colleges
• Organized the symposium

He asked if the project has helped the state of the field. Uliana said the travel grants and international visitors have had real curricular and programmatic results, although they have had more impact on faculty than students. Gitta noted that the project has gotten non-specialists interested in the region, which has filtered into classes. Larry reported that the curricular impact at Beloit has been light, but the college's dance program has forged some good links. Barclay felt that it was hard to measure impact. Tom observed that the task force's work has had little impact at Oberlin, largely because faculty there already have institutional opportunities.

The project did have some weaknesses in its work. Gitta was disappointed that we could not get more scientists involved, although Tom suggested that to attract scientists we would have needed a seminar tightly focused on their discipline. He felt that the task force tried to appeal everyone, which resulted in amorphous seminars. He believes that more focused topics would result in more applicants. Barclay replied that the task force made adjustments over time, including more focused seminar topics. Larry added that we rarely lacked for applicants, and Uliana noted the importance of interdisciplinarity. Larry was disappointed in the absence of curricular change, but Gitta noted that it would be hard for a two week seminar to yield a new course.

Dan observed that the Global Partners Project has been not only about the region, but also about collaboration. What have we learned about collaboration through the task force's work? Uliana said she had learned a lot about the other colleges. Larry stated that collaboration means partnership with other colleges and with people in the region, and that he has seen more benefit from the latter.

Discussion shifted to a more general review of the state of engagement with the region. Uliana stated that the region was not getting the attention in needed from the colleges. There are nascent signs of interest-Prague is popular with students, for instance-but there are not enough classes being taught and language enrollment is weak. Gitta concurred, noting that students seem to be interested in Central Europe and Central Asia, but not Russia. Tom said that we need to battle the perception that Russia is irrelevant. Barclay acknowledged the shifting interest to Central Asia, but stated that it is attention to the region. Uliana believes that specialists need to fight against irrelevance and get student attention. Tom stated that the economic landscape of studying the field has changed in the past six years. There are fewer funding sources than there were then, and forms of institutional support seem to have weakened, such as IREX's shift of focus to the Muslim world. Barclay noted that resources vary widely from campus to campus. Gitta said that advocacy for resources would have more impact with concerted action.

The task force then shared a variety of ideas for next steps, which were appropriate to colleges, consortia, or the three consortia. Among the ideas discussed were:

• Gitta: Take first year Russian students to Russia for a short trip, to build their commitment to the language.
• Uliana: Develop bilateral agreements between our liberal arts colleges and colleges in the region
• Larry: Require future international visitors to visit a college in each consortium, to help build connections across the consortia
• Gitta: A central person (perhaps in a consortial office) who can deal with visa issues
• Tom: Get attention of administrators, including presidents and deans
• Uliana: Use campus governance to create an advocate
• Gitta: Take an administrator along on an off-campus trip
• Uliana: Use technology to deliver courses on the web. Also, have a central person who can maintain a web site to which faculty can contribute
• Gitta: Speakers' bureau--a list of faculty and topics on which they'd be willing to speak for other campuses

The discussion concluded with the importance of having colleges develop a serious institutional commitment to international studies, and to the region.

Dan mentioned that a small Global Partners group was thinking about creating a self-funded faculty seminar, similar to previous seminars but funded by the colleges or the participants. Task force members felt that it would be hard to get participants to pay for it, and that recruiting leadership would be hard. It might be more effective, they felt, to encourage people participate in CIEE seminars.

The meeting concluded with a few ideas to wrap up the task force's work. Uliana proposed making a video with interviews of some of the most interesting projects we have supported; it could be used to convince deans and potential funders of the region's importance. Gitta suggested a mini-symposium, with the goal of bringing together committed and excited faculty with administrators to build institutional commitment. Uliana proposed discussing these issues at deans' meetings. Larry suggested a final round of travel grants, this time aimed at students. Students would need to apply by the first of January 2006, would need to travel by the end of the summer 2006, and share the results of their travel with their campus. Funds would be available for travel to the former Soviet republics and Central Europe, but not Germany. The task force liked this idea; Dan said he would discuss the idea with Elizabeth Hayford and if possible move forward with it quickly.