First Steering Committee Meeting of ’13-’14: 8/29/13
Announcements:
- Organization Fair: We need all hands on deck for recruiting the next class for Mentor Carol Smith! Get the word out there – both at and before the org fair. The next class’s focus country will be Namibia.
- Periclean Social coming up on September 1st from 4-6PM in Belk Pavilion 208. There will be Indian food at the social as well.
- Summit for Transformative Education: Weekend of Oct 18-20th. Three Pericleans, one from each Class, will be sent sent to this conference. It’s an opportunity to meet other undergraduates who are doing things similar to us. Dr. Arcaro is meeting with his counterparts at other NC universities to pull together similar groups for networking and to share knowledge and skills. Classes need to decide who wants to go and who can go. One Periclean Mentor has already been funded to go.
- The Junior class is in charge of planning and coordinating the Celebrating Periclean Scholars event. Tom and Crista generally choose a Periclean alumn to speak.
- The Blog: A one-stop shop for all things Periclean. Encourage people to bookmark this page and visit it.
- The Steering Committee meetings’ main function is to facilitate communication and coordination between the different current classes. But after each week or so each class should make an update on the blog including what the class working on this week and action points about what you plan to do in the future.
- Letters to officials and national competitions: We have not been focusing on sending out letters as much as we could. Each semester all Periclean Classes should strive to have a folder of letters that they have sent out. This could be made into an assignment as it is very concrete and focused. Keep doing research on your country and it’s relationship with other countries. Be on a first name basis with the US ambassador to your country!
- Handbook: A longterm goal. A subcommittee or separate committee will be formed to update the handbook, which is currently online. The updated copy will be printed and copies will be available in the Periclean corner. The goal is to have this in our hands by the end of the semester and then to update it every year. The handbook goal is very doable – if you have people who have
- Photos for the Periclean Corner: The pictures in the Periclean Corner haven’t changed in years. Let’s get some new photos in there! The Periclean Corner will be moving soon to the Global Village and we need new decorations to spiffy up the area. Let’s make visitors, alumni, and potential members impressed by our space and let’s make them understand the impact of our work by how we present our space.
- The CRHP building in Jamkhed, India is now open! This is an effect of between the ’12s work and their documentary, “Health for All.”
- The ’09s. In Zambia, there is a community of people near Ndola with with Pericleans have worked since 1009. Four of these Habitat houses were built by the Pericleans. A microfinance program has been produced in the community to set up loans, focused on women, to enhance the community and particularly the financial stability of the community. They are working with Voster Tembo, a long-term partner of the area, and the Zambian Development Support Foundation.
- Steve Braye has expressed commitment to being the mentor of the ’18s! He was one of the mentors of the first class, who focused on Zambia. His class will be going back to this country. He will also be the interim director while Dr. Arcaro and Crista are gone this spring.
- Next Meeting September 12th @ 9:4o. In two weeks from today, we will have the next Steering Committee meeting.
Class Updates:
The ’14s just came back from their fourth trip to Appalachia. They went to St. Charles, Virginia. They were collecting info for the POD lectures. They talked to Ron Carson, the director of a black lung clinic, which you can read more about on their blog, https://blogs.elon.edu/pericleanscholars/category/class-of-2014-appalachia/. In the future, they will be going to a community event to get a more collective view. Currently, their focus is expanding to connect the three communities that they have worked with. (Note from Arcaro: make sure that you have deliverables for the POD lectures!) The class is also working on bringing in speakers from Appalachia in the upcoming year. A connection was made with a Key Club mentor in an Appalachian high school. They will be working on small projects with the club, including selling local vendors’ art online. (Note: maybe the art can also be sold in the food area of the Global Village?)
The ’15s read Little Princes, by Conor Grennan, over the summer. They are also reading A Crime So Monstrous this semester. Both books provide insight into child trafficking, which is their focus topic in Haiti. Currently, the class is forming committees to address their goals for the semester, including forming partnerships with child slavery organizations in both the United States as well as Haiti.
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