Crimson and Gold Connection; Dr. Alice Sagehorn and Dr. Bobby Winters

Welcome to Crimson and Gold Connection, keeping you connected to the people and current events at Pittsburgh State University. This week on Crimson and Gold Connection, I'm joined by Dr. Alice Seichon, Professor and Chair of Teaching and Leadership at Pittsburgh State University, and Dr. Bobby Winters, University Professor and Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Pittsburgh State University. Welcome both of you. Thank you. But we've come to talk about the Pittsburgh State University in Paraguay program. Now I understand Dr. Seichon that you're actually the founder of the program. Well yes, with others though, there were lots of others who joined in the efforts. In 2000, I went to Paraguay for the very first time, and because of the connection that through the partners of the Americas, Kansas and Paraguay were partnered and have had various exchanges, business exchanges, education exchanges, fine arts exchanges over the years, and I found quite a large interest in students from Paraguay wanting to come to Pittsburgh State. And because of the cost associated with that, they felt like they could only come for graduate school, which would be two years.

So with some others on campus at that time, the director of the International Programs and Services and other people who had been to Paraguay, we created what is now called PSU in Paraguay. And it allows for students in Paraguay to take PSU classes, one class at a time in Paraguay with our PSU professors. And so they are truly our PSU students, they don't have to transfer credit to anywhere else because it's PSU credit, and they can take up to 48 general education credit hours, and then when they come to PSU, they can complete a degree in two or two and a half years. I also understand that this is a significant year for the program because this is the 10th anniversary. That's correct. We've been going strong for 10 years, and I took over, I think, was it in 2012? 2012.

And the program was going strong then, and I've done my best not to mess it up any. It's a great opportunity for our professors. We, I think, probably have the highest density of faculty who have been to Paraguay of any college university in the country. It's a great experience for them. It really opens up the mind. And I know this because I went down for the first time in 2009 when Dr. Sage Horn was the director of the program. I took my family down, and it really opened our eyes to what South America is and what a great experience that it can be to visit there. You are a published mathematician, and we've seen some of your less formal columns in the local press and how it does. An expert on non-compact three manifolds and not theory come to be part of the PSU in Paraguay program. First, I do have a little bit of an adventurous spirit. That's why I said, yes, when Alice asked me to go down, I thought I'd like to see this. I did take a step over to the administrative side, and so when Alice decided to make the step into full-time department chair being the chair of the largest department on campus, I was approached as someone to consider taking over this.

And I thought it was just such a great program and a great opportunity. And quite frankly, the most adventurous thing I have ever done in my life, I would be a fool to turn it down. It has been an adventure, but in different ways than I expected. Dr. Sage Horn, I was looking at your brief resume on the website, and I noticed that you have specialisms in bilingual education and international and global education. How does that specialism translate into the Paraguay program? Well, that's what brought me by bilingual education is what brought me to Paraguay for the very first time. I was invited to go as part of a grant that the University had on internationalizing the curriculum. And I was looking for, I went there looking for schools, particularly bilingual schools, who wanted to have an exchange program with teachers in Kansas.

While there, I met a woman by the name of Barbara Karst, who runs a school called Santa Ana Calaheo. And it's a pre-K through 12 school that is both an international baccalaureate school and bilingual school. And I knew that that campus would be my new home in Paraguay because she had a St. Louis Cardinals baseball cap on her credenza. And she was originally from St. Louis and I'm originally from St. Louis, so we made a St. Louis connection. And it was in talking to the students, the 12th grade students who were getting ready to go to college at Santa Ana her school, that really started me thinking about, well, how can we have these kids come from Paraguay to the US? And how can we make a strong connection with these students while they're here? And what can we do for our undergraduate students? Because this is not just a one way kind of an experience.

We are really fortunate that we've had a few, not many, but a few Kansas students, PSU students who have chosen to spend a month, the two months, in Paraguay taking PSU courses again from PSU professors that they could have done in summer school here. But they went to Paraguay and took the classes and added that unicequia, that little bit of thing that life experience to their college careers, and got to experience a country that most people couldn't find on a map. So it would be fair for me to say that you perceive benefits of both institutions in the program. Without a doubt, as Dr. Winters said earlier, we have more faculty who have been abroad for educational purposes while they're there, they also do some of their own research. So they teach, they do research, many of them do service while they're there.

And I would challenge any other university to talk about their investment in another country the way we have invested in Paraguay. That's right. We do have a lot of Paraguay and experience. We are unmatched. I'm not afraid to just make that boldest statement. We could not find anything like this anywhere else. It's a unique program. You form the personal bonds. You get down there, you get perhaps while you're teaching out of your comfort zone. You make this realization that Paraguay and South America is not just extrapolated from your knowledge of Taco Bell. It's a huge, different experience. There is just so much that we don't know and don't know that we don't know. You make the connections and you get to know the students and you want to do whatever you can to help in their educational experiences. And I'd like to add that in 2011, I believe, the University won a Paul Simon Award for Internationalization,

which is one of the biggest awards given to colleges and universities in the United States for Internationalization. And part of that, there was really three parts that caused us to win that award. And one of them was the PSU and Paraguay program. Dr. Bobby Winters and Dr. Raleigh Stachon, thank you very much for visiting with us today. Thank you. 4K RPS and for Crimson & Gold Connection, I'm Robert Smith. Join us for Crimson & Gold Connection, Wednesdays at 8.50 and Fridays at 350.