Academic Accomplishments

Susan Penksa continued her research and consulting for the European Union and other agencies in Brussels and Sarajevo. In Sarajevo, she served as a keynote speaker at a seminar examining the impact of the EU Police Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina from 2002-2012. The EU Delegation and US Embassy to Bosnia and Herzegovina sponsored a reception for Susan's latest book, The European Union in Global Security: The Politics of Impact, co-authored with Roy Ginsberg of Skidmore College. The book launch was covered by the prime time news in Sarajevo.

Helen Rhee traveled in Asia, including South Korea, teaching in churches and offering seminary courses. She also presented a paper at a conference of the Asian Pacific Early Christian Studies Society. This was Helen's first time back in Korea in nineteen years. Much has changed. She reports that her relatives didn't recognize her at first and that her childhood home has become "a hip clothing store."

Edd Noell ventured to China and Korea as well, serving as a visiting professor and co-leader of a study trip of Wheaton College economics and business majors. Prior to their travels, Edd taught a summer course at Wheaton on Globalization and Asian Economies. The photo shows Edd with the students at the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. "I've enjoyed traveling in Korea and China," Edd writes, "with a group that asks insightful questions at our company visits and encourages each other in the faith."

Bruce Fisk and Tom Fikes flew to the Middle East to lay some groundwork for the upcoming Jerusalem Semester in Spring 2013. They visited Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, and Palestine (West Bank and Gaza). Tom observes, “I continue to be deeply moved and changed by this place -- the land itself is transformative, as the cradle of the great monotheistic religions, and this is amplified by the knowledge that the way in which my (transformed) faith and that of my students is lived out has real consequences for the fate of these people.” The photo of the young girl is from Gaza City, Gaza. As Tom notes, "she can't be more than 5 or 6, and I'm not sure whether at that age such a look conveys the hopeless frustration of the world's largest open air prison (1.6 million people in a plot of land smaller than Santa Barbara and Goleta, with 90% of its economy smuggled in illegally from Egypt) . . . or perhaps just a dropped ice cream cone."

Four of our faculty went to Costa Rica. Andrew Mullen was in San José, the capital, overseeing the credential program for education majors who were completing their student teaching there last year. Our students are engaged at Lincoln School, a private institution in the Barrio San Miguel de Santa Domingo de Heredia; the school provides bicultural and bilingual education for preschool-to-12th-grade students. Andrew writes, "we've been at Lincoln School since 1987 and had a total of approximately 80 student teachers there over the course of our partnership, and two alumni on full-time staff there this most recent school year."  Photo: Westmont student Sarah Venable from Montana in a 4th-grade class.

In a separate venture, Chris Milner, John Moore and Glenn Town spent a week in Costa Rica investigating the possibility of collaborating with Whitworth University on a study-abroad program.  Westmont had five kinesiology students interning at various clinics as part of the Whitworth's existing program.  Students also completed a Spanish medical terminology course as part of their experience.

John Blondell was in Macedonia and London in April and May, directing the Bitola National Theatre production of Shakespeare's Henry VI, Part 3 for the Globe to Globe Festival, presented by Shakespeare's Globe as part of the 2012 Cultural Olympiad (photo).  In July, he will travel back to Macedonia to set the play at the 10th-century Church of Saint Sophia as part of the Ohrid Summer Festival, and will continue on to Tirana, Albania, where he will begin preparations for directing A Midsummer Night's Dream, which will open in midsummer 2013.

Mark Nelson also traveled to England and spent some time meeting with people at the IDEA CETL ethics study center in Leeds to discuss opportunities for collaboration.

Omedi Ochieng traveled to Kenya to work with students from the University of Nairobi and Maseno University.  He and the students conducted interviews with Kenyan philosophers for his work on "African conceptions of the good life."  Dinora Cardosa was in Madrid at the end of June, serving  as the chair of  the sixth international congress of the  Asociación Hispánica de Humanidades. Marianne Robins spent several weeks in France, interviewing the children and relatives of Holocaust rescuers and survivors in Le Chambon.  The opportunity to be away and to research and write was a refreshing reminder of  "how important it is to stay connected." Tremper Longman taught a course on the book of Job at Ambrose University College in Calgary.   He had students from Ghana, Sudan, and China in addition to Canadians.  He also traveled to Toronto to serve on a committee for a dissertation on Job at McMaster University.