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ROTIUNDA
SIXTY-SIXTH YEAR
SFPTEMBER 23, 1986
NUMBER ONE
Student Teaching In Korea— Heart And Seoul Two Longwood College seniors will have an opportunity to truly be "ambassadors" for their alma mater. Sarah Thayer and Beth Meehan, both elementary education majors, will do their student-teaching in Seoul, South Korea, beginning later this month. They are following in the footsteps of Amy Ethridge, who student-taught in Seoul early last spring. Interestingly, Thayer and Meehan are members of a highly selective student public-relations group called the Longwood Ambassadors. Ethridge, who was graduated in May and teaches now at Osboum High School in Manassas, also was a Longwood Ambassador. She was the first Longwood student to student-teach in a foreign country. Like Ethridge, Thayer and Meehan will teach at the Seoul International School, a private, English-speaking school with students from 35 countries. The school has 700 to 800 students in grades K through 12, about onethird of whom are Americans. "I'm really excited," said Thayer, who is from Richmond. "I'm glad Beth and I have a chance to represent Longwood." Thayer will teach in grades K4, which is what she will be certified to teach along with reading, K-12.
Meehan, from Winchester, will teach in grades 4-8, which is the focus of her certification. "I'm not nervous about teaching there - not yet, at least," she said. "But I know that I will be. My modules have been so hectic that I haven't had time to get nervous." Both are now attending the first
session of modules — minicourses for prospective teachers. Because they will still be overseas in December, they will be excused from the second session, which follows studentteaching. Beth and Sarah left Sept. 21 from National Airport outside Washington and will fly to Seattle
and then to Seoul. The two-part flight will take 20 hours. Neither has ever traveled abroad. During their student-teaching, each will live with a Korean family, as did Ethridge. They will teach for about 10 weeks. One aspect of the school should make them feel at home: it has a Wendy's restaurant, which is
Seoul, with 10 million, is the same size as New York and is the world's fourth largest city. The two students hope to attend the Asian Games in Seoul, an Olympic-like track and field that runs through the end of October. Afterward, they will travel in the Orient for four weeks. They'll visit China, Hong Kong, Japan and finally Hawaii, returning on Dec. 20. While Dr. Robert Gibbons, Longwood's director of student teaching, is attending a conference of international schools in Jakarta, Indonesia, in November, he will visit several other Asian countries to see about placing student-teachers. Several Longwood education majors have expressed interest in student-teaching overseas, he said. He also will be recruiting students for Longwood. Thayer is head of the Judicial Board, Oktoberfest chairman, and a member of Geist, a leadership society. She was top caller in the Alumni Telefund last spring. Meehan is a former Orientation leader.
Beth Meehan (left) and Sarah Thayer
Longwood's Business Innovation Center— "The U.S. has lost its ability to compete in the world economy," stated Lawrence Minks, Executive Director of the Ixmgwood Business Innovation Center. In order to help remedy this situation, Longwood College will open the L. B. I. C. later this fall. It will provide a wide range of services to new and existing businesses in Southside Virginia. And it can well be a national model for other rural communities, according to an official of the U.S. Department of Commerce. The Center will:
where students eat lunch. "Amy said the only difference is that the chili there is served with rice," said Meehan. "One day, she caught a kid who had sneaked his French fries into class."
•Support programs that inspire economic development, entrepreneurship, and human resource development. •Strengthen the region's business and industrial competitiveness in domestic and international markets. •Assist efforts to diversify the region's economy. Examples of services to be provided by the Center are: •Assisting new businesses in their development and growth. •Identifying national and international sources of assistance.
•Conducting several advanced management seminars. •Speakers, presentations, and information for interested groups. •Computer-software packages for use by organizations. •Self-adminsitered manuals to help inventors and entrepreneurs evaluate business ideas, and help them conduct preliminary patent-search activities. •Assisting in computerized searches of new technology that may be adapted or applied to a new or existing business. •Simulating new courses in
Opening Soon
Entrepreneurship and New Venture Development through Longwood's School of Business and Economics. •Management materials to help businesses improve their productivity, quality, organizational development, and competitiveness. "The Center's approach is unique in that it will look more to the businesses of the future which can diversify the local economy rather than conventional businesses," according to Theodore J. Lettes of the U.S. Department of Commerce.
He said that "areas of future growth and emerging business opportunities of interest to the Center will be the result of new global markets, the explosion of new technologies, and the resurgence of entrepreneurship in the United States." "This is the basis," he said "for creating jobs and re-establishing the competitive capability of the U.S. within the context of world markets." The Center will be directed by Dr. Larry C. Minks, associate professor of business at (Continued on Page 2)