STUDENT LEADS CLASS
LORA TAKES NASHVILLE
News photographer Marcus Smith features a student working in the infant and child development lab through photos.
Wide receiver Erik Lora traveled to Nashville, Tenn. to receive honors as the OVC Male Athlete of the Year this past Friday.
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Dai ly Eastern News
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Tuesday, June 4, 2013
“TELL THE TRUTH AND DON’T BE AFRAID”
STUDY ABROAD | CONFERENCE
VOL. 97 | ISSUE 155
Studying close to home Faculty and administrators represent Eastern in St. Louis at annual international conference by Robyn Dexter @robyn_dexter
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Blair Lord, the provost and vice president for academic affairs; Kelly Holland, the director of study abroad and Kevin Vickers, the director of the Office of International Students and Scholars stand outside a poster introducing the St. Louis conference from May 26-31.
Members of the Eastern community ventured to St. Louis last week for the annual National Association of Foreign Student Advisers conference. Three staff members from the Office of Study Abroad, Kelly Holland, Sarah Grandstaff and Sara Boro, joined with Kevin Vickers from the Office of International Students and Scholars and Provost Blair Lord to attend the 65th annual conference. Holland, the director of study abroad, said she and Boro presented in a poster fair Wednesday. “Poster fairs are set up kind of in a similar fashion to an undergraduate research fair,” she said. Holland and Boro participated with a hard copy of a poster regarding enhancing learning before, during and after studying abroad. “ We talked about the Study Abroad Society, which is our registered student organization,” she said. “Turns out, that’s not really common at other schools (to have a study abroad RSO).” Holland also gave a presentation in the technology fair Friday with information about Hootsuite, a social media management system. “We set up a laptop, and I talked about how we use it in our office,” she said. “There were about 20 other people set up talking about dif-
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ferent uses of social media and education abroad.” Holland and Vickers were able to sit down with some of Eastern’s partners in international education from countries such as Germany, Australia and South Korea. “It’s one of the only times of the year we get to actually meet some of the people we work with,” she said. “All those emails back and forth across the pond, and then you finally get to meet them in person.” Holland said the conference is an ideal networking opportunity for all people who attend. The NAFSA conference brought together more than 8,000 administrators, presidents, faculty and staff to exchange ideas and programming schedules. “It’s not just U.S. organizations who are sending students out — it’s also organizations throughout the world who are bringing American students in,” Holland said. Vickers, the director of OISS, said he met with the university’s partners and consultants that he works with around the world. “I did a lot of networking,” he said. “I also attended sessions on the best practices in the areas of international recruiting and partnership agreements with other universities.” While Holland and Vickers attended sessions and met with partner schools, Blair Lord, the provost and vice president for academic affairs, went to sessions designated for
presidents and vice presidents in international education. Lord said he was in St. Louis Wednesday and Thursday, where he went to a special program for presidents and other representatives about how to internationalize campuses and curriculum. “We had a dinner and a representative from the World Bank talking about Spanish-speaking countries and their importance,” Lord said. “It was extremely interesting.” Lord said there were about 35 presidents from all over the world, and he had the chance to talk to officials from countries like Turkey and Peru. Holland, Vickers and Lord all said they took different aspects away from the conference. Lord said he learned about building international aspects into the tenure process. “Everyone had some very different ideas,” he said. “I was fascinated by the Arab world and the South American culture.” Vickers said he enjoys going to these conferences because of the different kinds of people he has the chance to meet. “You can learn a lot and do your homework in terms of what works and what doesn’t,” he said. “You can pretty much strike up a conversation with anyone there because we all work in similar fields.”
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Local | CIT Y COUNCIL
First Mid branch to close June 28 Council to approve waste plant cleanup By Marcus Smith @ma_masmith
The Martin Luther King Jr. University Union branch of First MidIllinois Bank & Trust is being closed June 28 so more services can be offered to Eastern students at the two other branches here in Charleston. Mandy Lewis, vice president of marketing, said the administrators at First Mid had been considering what to do with the Union branch for some time. “We have been looking at the EIU banking center for a little bit of time now,” she said “And it’s one of those things when we look at it and evaluate it, it’s a win-win for us.” Lewis said there are two branches in town, one at 500 West Lincoln Ave. and one at 701 Sixth St., and both are still located close to campus and offer more services than the Union branch offers. “It’s a good opportunity to be
able to move those customers to facilities that are better able to suit their needs,” Lewis said. William Weber, vice president of business affairs, said the closing of the Union branch will have little effect on Eastern. “I don’t see any major impact on the campus overall,” Weber said. Weber said there will be a small adjustment period, but the transition will be a minor change. He said he does not know yet what may go in to replace First Mid-Illinois, but it will be the decision of the student affairs office. Dan Nadler, vice president for student affairs, could not be reached for comment. Lewis said the Lincoln branch is close to a Panther Shuttle stop, along with online and mobile banking options, and the inconvenience should be minimal. “A lot of our customers aren’t coming to the branches as much as they used to in the past,” she said.
Lewis said customers that need to deposit checks have the option of going to one of the branches or using one of the ATMs that accept deposits. Weber also said there is greater use of online banking by people in general nowadays. “These days many people, not just students, handle most of their banking needs electronically,” Weber said. Lewis said the employees at the Union branch will be transitioned to other locations and most of the part-time student employees were not going to be returning. “We truly value our relationship with Eastern and we look forward to continuing to serve the needs of our customers, whether that is the staff, faculty or the students,” Lewis said. Marcus Smith can be reached at 581-2812 or masmith6@eiu.edu.
By Amanda Wilkinson @akaywilkinson The Charleston City Council will be voting on moving into phase II of cleaning up the old wastewater treatment plant on F Street Tuesday. The meeting will be hosted at 7:30 p.m. in the council chambers of City Hall, 520 Jackson Ave. Mayor Larry Rennels said the old plant was abandoned in the 1970s when the new wastewater treatment plant on West Madison Avenue was built. “They quit using that old one, and then they used that property as the police department’s firing range,” he said. Rennels said both the fire and police departments have training facilities off the old plant property. “We just need to clean it up,” he said. “We need to get rid of all the
remnants of the wastewater treatment plant. It’s something that’s been sitting there for a long time. There’s a lot of stuff back there. We don’t even know for sure what all it’s going to take to clean it up.” The city started the process about a year ago and it will take a while to complete, Rennels said. The city will hire Shaw Environmental for evaluating the property and cleanup for about $45,000. “We’re probably going to see if we can get some help from other sources to pay for it because it’s an expensive process,” Rennels said. The council will also be voting on Tax Increment Financing grants for the Sensible Rehabilitation program. Rennels said the area around the Square has been designated as the TIF district. PLANT, page 5