Semester at Sea Program Celebrates 20 Years at Pitt

University of Pittsburg ^ | Julian Asenjo

[Cincinatus' Wife]

The Spring 2001 semester marked the 20th anniversary of the Semester at Sea program at the University of Pittsburgh. The program has been sponsored academically by the University since 1981 and is administered by the Institute for Shipboard Education. Semester at Sea is offered as one of many study abroad opportunities made available through Pitt's University Center for International Studies. Central to the mission of the program are the University and the institute's ongoing cooperative commitment to combine academic excellence with cross-cultural experiential programming.

While the first voyage in the spring of 1981 sailed with only five Pitt students, the spring 2001 voyage sailed with a record 75 Pitt students. During the past 43 Semester at Sea voyages, 20,153 undergraduates representing an estimated 1,200 different colleges and universities have participated under the University of Pittsburgh's sponsorship. Of them, 932 have been Pitt students. An additional 123 faculty and 139 staff members from Pitt also have participated.

The program was among the first to take large groups of students in the early 1980s into mainland China and later, in the mid-1980s, to the former Soviet Union. Other benchmarks during the past 20 years include renewed visits to South Africa in the early 1990s, the inclusion of Vietnam and Cambodia as part of the field component in 1994, and most recently, Cuba since 1999.

During the past two decades, participants have had the opportunity to engage in dialogue with public figures such as Madeline Albright, Corazon Aquino, Peter Arnett, Fidel Castro, Arthur C. Clarke, Mikhail Gorbachev, Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa, Richard Threlkeld, and Desmond Tutu.

A particularly successful element of Semester at Sea's in-port field program since 1994 has been involvement at the local level of area kindergarten to 12th grade students through the Vicarious Voyage Around the World program. Coordinated through the institute in conjunction with the shipboard administration, groups of three to five Semester at Sea students "adopt" a grade school class and communicate with them throughout the term. Personal exchanges during the voyage provide K-12 students with a very real connection to the experiences of those traveling around the world. Items sent home in "culture packets" - a newspaper, menu, map, stamps, or language brochure - enable the teacher to make the international learning experience come alive in the local classroom.

Recently, Semester at Sea also celebrated 10 years of exchange visits with the Dalit, or Untouchable, communities in India. Over 1,200 participants have benefited from these encounters during the past 40 visits.

The Semester at Sea program is offered during both fall and spring semesters aboard the SS Universe Explorer and accommodates more than 600 students during the 100-day voyage. A summer session program also is available and accommodates more than 400 undergraduates during a 62-day voyage aboard the MTS World Renaissance.

Student, faculty, and staff information as well as applications can be found at Semester at Sea

-Julian Asenjo

Research Grants

[Cincinatus' Wife]

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Andrew Waples, of Bow New Hampshire, laughs next to Cuban President Fidel Castro December 6, 2002. Waples was one of more than 700 American students visiting Communist Cuba on a round-the-world educational cruise organized by the University of Pittsburg. REUTERS/Rafael Perez

Lloyd Lewan, dean of the University of Pittsburg's Semester at Sea round-the-world educational cruise, thanks Cuban President Fidel Castro for taking the time to meet with more than 700 American college students December 6, 2002. Castro spoke to the students for three hours. REUTERS/Rafael Perez

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Fidel Castro - Cuba

[BCrago66]

I went to Pitt too.

I'd like to have those disgusting lefties spend a week getting tortured as political prisoner's in Castro's prisons.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

The Left is indoctrinating our youth - page out of Castro's communist book.

[BCrago66]

prisoner's = prisoners. Sleep deprivation.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Bump!

Chávez's school plans ignite furor in Venezuela ***New history texts for fourth- and sixth-graders published in 1999 praised Chávez's coup attempt and branded as ``corrupt oligarchies'' the two parties that ruledVenezuela since the late 1950s, Democratic Action and COPEI.

Chávez has also greatly expanded a system of paramilitary classes in public high schools that had long been on the books but were seldom held, portraying them as ``the founding stones of the new Venezuelan man.'' ``He is promoting militarism, infecting texts with viruses that foster class hatreds ... and speak against globalization and privatization,'' Raffalli said in an interview.

Chávez recently signed a deal with Cuba under which Havana will train Venezuelan teachers and provide educational materials, and Education Minister Hector Navarro last year approved a nationwide essay competition on the life of Argentine-born Cuban revolutionary Ernesto ``Ché'' Guevara. Most of the Cuban aid is going to some 500 ``Bolivarian Schools'' established around the nation of 24 million people for the poorest of the poor, offering three meals a day and on-site medical care.***

[Benrand]

Why don't they get to talk to people like Margaret Thatcher and Lee Kwan Yew?

Oh yeah, higher education...

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Yeah. We don't want any fair and balanced. Just pure propagada please.

[xsmommy]

OMG, this is my alma mater and i was a latin american studies major too! i am astounded. i will be writing a letter. i am furious.

[Leisler]

I know a lot of guys that spent semesters at sea learning. It's called the Navy, and they would love to play a joke of the lawyer, thug, murderer fidel.

[dennisw]

Effing leftist lovefest. I can't wait 'till Castro looks like this:

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Bumps!!!