2005 James E. Smith Midwest Conference on World Affairs Schedule

Ann Marie Harr
James E. Smith Midwest Conference on World Affairs coordinator, 308.865.8944

MONDAY – 3/7/05
    
9:05am – 9:55am                Ponderosa E
Roundtable discussion about the future of public education
Kieren Egan
Professor, College of Education
Simon Fraser University
Burnaby, Canada
Cecilia Zarate
Cofounder of the Colombia Support Network

10:10am – 11:00 am             Ponderosa A
Ethnic Identity and Conflict in Education
Jaime Aparicio, Ambassador, Embassy of Bolivia
Cristina Camacho, Second Secretary, Embassy of Ecuador
Khazar Ibrahim, Educational Officer, Embassy of Azerbaijan

11:15am – 12:05pm             Ponderosa C
Higher Education in Iraq: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
J. Thomas Owens, Project Director, Al Sharaka Program for Higher Education in Iraq, College of Continuing Education, University of Oklahoma

11:15am – 12:05pm             Ponderosa D
International Exchange: Vytautas Magnus and UNK
Antanas Gostautas, Chair, Department of Theoretical Psychology, Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas, Lithuania

12:20pm
Take a Delegate to Lunch

1:30pm – 3:00pm             Ponderosa A
Panel Discussion on Immigration Issues
Panel will view introduction to the Mockumentary:”A Day Without a Mexican” as a point of departure
Edward W. Leahy, Coordinator
Immigrant Rights Network of Iowa and Nebraska
Carole Nagengast, Chair of the Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico
Luis Alva, Deputy Consul General, Consulate of Mexico, Omaha, Nebraska

3:15pm – 4:30pm             Ponderosa A
Serve to Learn/Learn to Serve 
Edward W. Leahy, Coordinator
Immigrant Rights Network of Iowa and Nebraska
Jorge Santamaria, Pastor
Cristo Cordero de Dios
Grand Island, Nebraska

7:30pm             Fine Arts Recital Hall
MAIN PERFORMANCE  
Richard Kogan, Pianist
Music and Medicine : George Gershwin

TUESDAY-3/8/05

9:30am – 11:00am             Ponderosa C/D
Higher Education Reform in the Newly Expanded European Union: Will Education become too costly and too generic?
Vytautas Kaminskas, Rector, Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas, Lithuania
Antanas Gostautas, Chair, Department of Theoretical Psychology, Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas, Lithuania
Nijole Gostautaite Midttun, Interpreter for session

9:30am – 11:00am             Ponderosa A/B
Learning Ethnic and Religious Identity as the “Other”
Dr. Saurjan Yakupov, Director, Sharh va Tavsiya Sociology Center, Tashkent, Uzbekistan
Dr. Eva Borreguera – Department of Political Science and Administration, Complutense University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain
Kornelija Jurgaitiene, Minister Plenipotentiary, Embassy of the Republic of Lithuania
Carole Nagengast, Chair of the Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico

12:30pm – 1:45pm             Ponderosa E
KEYNOTE ADDRESS
The Mind we Share: Tools of the Imagination
Kieren Egan, Professor, College of Education, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada

Kieran Egan will explore the “tools of the imagination”- such as stories, metaphor, images generated from words, associating with the heroic, probing the limits of experience and the possible and how these can form the most secure basis for a broader and more global form of education that can emphasize our connection to the “other” rather than our differences.

2:00pm – 3:15pm             Ponderosa A/B
Education and Fundamentalism
Raheem Yaseer, Assistant Director, Afghan Studies Center, University of Nebraska Omaha
Robert Wolfson, Executive Director, Plains States Region, Anti Defamation League
Mushtak Malik, Embassy of Pakistan
Alaa Eldin Youssef, Counselor, Embassy of Egypt

2:00pm – 3:15pm             Ponderosa E
Development of Programs to Assist the Integration of Immigrant Families/Students in Nebraska
Karen Buchfinch, ELL Counselor, Crete High School
Odalys Perez, Director, Multicultural Coalition of Grand Island
Amir A. Azimi, Administrator, Health and Human Services, Lincoln, Nebraska
Jerry Bergstrom, Principal, Pershing Elementary School, Lexington, NE

3:30pm – 5:00pm             Ponderosa E
Employee Life Around the Globe: Understanding How “Others” View the Workplace
Presented by the UNK Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) team and the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) student chapter