Project History
The Juarez-Lincoln-Marti International Education Project (born as the
SUNY-Mexico Faculty/Students Exchange Project) was conceived after a
conversation held at the American Embassy, with the Cultural Attache and
the Fulbright-Garcia Robles Interim Executive Director, in Mexico City, in
the Summer of 1994.
As our Fulbright tour arrived to conclusion, we were told that it was supposed
to be just the beginning, the jump-start of our involvement in this area.
We could use our experience as a point of departure and to continue our
efforts to strengthen the links and expand the mutual knowledge between the
peoples of Mexico and the US. And so we did, starting with the Academics
and Students of these two great countries.
Our experience with Mexican provincial institutions indicated that lack of
textbooks and materials was one serious constraint for their development.
On the other hand, we knew of the constant flow of sample textbooks that
American academics receive from many publishers eager to have us adopt
their material in our courses.
So, putting two plus two together, we started, during the Fall of 1994, a
drive among SUNY Cortland science faculty. We asked them to donate some of
these sample books to Mexican provincial institutions. The response was
overwhelming and I collected several boxes of physics, chemistry, biology,
mathematics, computer science, sociology, etc. textbooks. We shipped one
box (with over two dozen books with a market value of several hundred
dollars) to Laredo, TX. And the USIS office in Mexico City agreed to
transport them from there and deliver them to our Mexican colleagues.
We continued building on the contacts made, with Mexican institutions and
USIS, and prepared a visit for the summer of 1995. During this visit, the
groundwork for formal cooperation links between SUNY and Mexican
institutions were established Also, during that visit to Mexico (on our
own time and budget) we took a second box of over two dozen textbooks and
donated them to the library of the UAT at Tampico, Tamaulipas.
During our summer 1995 visit we established contact with the CIE of ITAM and
agreed to submit a proposal to the NSF International Opportunities
competition. In this proposal we proposed to develop a simulation model in
GPSS for the study and evaluation of acquatic ecosystems. In addition, we
proposed to organize a group of Mexican researchers interested in
ecological problems and to link them with their American peers. This
proposal was submitted to NSF in November and a list of interested
researchers was started. This list was the origin of the ongoing Mexican
researcher list that this project operates.
In previous years, we had participated in the SUNY CIT (Conferences for
Instructional Technology in education) annual events. The Spring 1997 CIT
was being organized and we were part of the Steering Committee. We requested
from its FACT (the supporting SUNY Committee) that some scholarships were
donated to invite some Mexican colleagues to this important forum. The FACT
Committee reacted very positively to our request and graciously donated
three full scholarships to the CIT97 Conference. They included conference
registration, room, board and materials. We would provide (pro bono) these
Mexican scholars with all transportation, support and interface
arrangements on the American side. The selection of the scholars was left
to the USIS office in Mexico City, who graciously cooperated in this task
and in the liaison aspects on the Mexican side. The USIS office and the
American Attache in Mexico were so enthusiastic about this project that
they also donated an air fare from Mexico to Syracuse, for one of the
scholars.
As a result of this success, the hopes and contacts with Mexican
institutions increased and we prepared a second trip to Mexico. In the
summer of 1996, we drove down with a third box of over two dozen textbooks
that were given to the USIS Monterrey office as a donation for Mexican
universities. We presented our project to over two dozen Mexican Directors
of International Educations and of Research, in Monterrey, Mexico City and
several other provincial universities. The USIS office in Mexico City
helped us out with many contacts and by organizing a Breakfast at the
University Club. The contacts made provided the initial impetus to our
project's second email list: for Academics and Administrators interested in
educational exchange.
At our return, we presented our trip results and several letters of interest
from Mexican institutions, for student exchange, and looked into including
our Campus in the RAMP Consortium. At this stage we approached the UUP, the
SUNY Faculty Union, who was very supportive of our ideas and helped us
establish contact with the SUNY System Office of International Education,
in Albany NY.
The SUNY wide Director of International Education understood our concerns
and operational problems and provided us with a $500 minigrant to cover
some of our phone/fax expenses (the rest would be done via email and on our
own). In addition, the UUP union agreed to provide additional support for
the attendance of Mexican scholars to the 1997 CIT Conference.
Another result of our second (1996) trip to Mexico was establishing contact
with CUCBA, the environmental campus of the University of Guadalajara. A
second proposal on environmental modeling was submitted to NSF
International Operations in the 1997 competition, this time with CUCBA.
During the 1997 CIT (at SUNY Brockport) we obtained three full scholarships
for Mexican faculty: two from FACT Committee and one from UUP. Four
Mexicans came that year, an additional one paying its own way but at the
internal SUNY rates, that our Project had obtained. We also provided, as in
the previous year, the transportation, logistic support and interface in
the American side. USIS Mexico City selected the scholars and provided the
interface in Mexico as well as one air fare to one of the scholars. At this
1997 CIT, a panel on international education was organized and all Mexican
scholars presented at it.
From our contacts in Mexico, rose another opportunity. In the Spring of 1997
a FIPSE Trilateral proposal to move 75 students between the US, Mexico and
Canada, was written and presented. Participants were the universities of
Anahuac and Veracruzana, in Mexico, SUNY-ESF and Washington, in the US and
Guelch and British Columbia, in Canada. We the were Co-PI for the American
proposal, from SUNY-ESF.
In the Fall of 1997, another FIPSE proposal, to move American students to
Mexico, was presented. We proposed to teach two bilingual courses in
science (statistics, computer programming) at SUNY, with a third course
taught at the Universidad Veracruzana, in Jalapa, for both American and
Mexican students.
Also in the Fall of 1997, contacts were made with the UNERG, Universidad
Romulo Gallegos, in Guarico, Venezuela. They required some workshops in
uses of technology in science education and some assessments of their
needs, in order to establish an exchange program with SUNY. Fundayacucho,
the Venezuelan Higher Education agency, was sponsoring it. We were sent in
January of 1998 to Venezuela, for three weeks, to teach such workshops and
provide the support to UNERG for establishing a program with SUNY. As
usual, several science books were donated to the institution.
As a result of our trip and conversations with Faculty, a program of
"apprenticieship" was devised. Through it, an UNERG faculty came to our
Campus, in the Spring of 1998, to work with us, share our office and
classes and learn more about higher education in the US and perfect his
English skills. The program covered room and board -his institution only
paying for his air fare.
The 1998 CIT took place in our SUNY campus and this time four Mexican
scholars were funded, by the FACT Committee, the UUP union and SUNY. As in
previous years, USIS office selected the candidates, provided all
interfaces at the Mexican end and donated an air fare. We provided all
interface at the US end and provided transportation, logistic support and
interface here. A second panel, on international education, was also
organized for the participation of the Mexican colleagues.
In the summer of 1998 we returned to Venezuela, to participate in the III
CIBEM (Congreso Iberoamericano de Ensenanza de Matematicas) where we
presented a paper on the development of an international program for
Iberoamerica, in statistics and operations research. In addition, we
visited again the UNERG, participated in the revision of the computer
science program and delivered an expensive and delicate medical equipment,
donated by SUNY, that they were previously unable to send to Venezuela.
In the Summer and Fall of 1998, we participated in programs or projects
dealing with our native Cuba. In the summer, we presented a paper to the
Annual Meeting of the Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy, in
Miami, with a project for Faculty Development in a Transitional Cuba. Funds
to develop such project have been requested but so far these requests have
been unsuccessful. In the Fall, we were invited by the SUNY-Brooklin School
of Nursing to deliver a talk on our work to several Cuban doctors who were
participating in an exchange program with them.
In the Winter of 1998, after fourteen years with SUNY, we decided to
take the "early retirement" option. We arrived to the conclusion that
the environment was not conducive to our professional growth, nor that
of our intended international education project. And we moved on.
In the Spring of 1999, we again submitted a proposal to FACT, requesting
scholarships for Mexican colleagues. FACT generously gave us four half
scholarships, contingent of us obtaining the other four halves from other
sources (as we had done in previous years). Again we went to the UUP union
for help. UUP replied that this time they would support other projects,
since they had already supported us for two years. We then thought of other
sources of funding such as Rotary, but could not find the support in time
and the FACT scholarships could not be used. No Mexican scholars attended
CIT99, for we could not find, in the short time after the UUP notice,
the necessary donors to cover the second half of the scholarships.
In the Spring of 1999 we submitted two proposals to the US Department of
Education, from IITRI, our new place of employment. One of these was on
International Education and pertained to the establishment of relations
with other education organizations in the world. Our proposals were
again finalists in the NCES competition.
In the Summer of 1999, we presented a paper to the Annual Meeting of the
Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy on the development of
"international" professionals (those trained to work across national
boundaries and with multinational professional groups in international
projects). The paper is published in the 1999 ASCE Proceedengs.
Also in the Summer of 1999 we reorganized the program: the Web Page was
created and the objectives were revised. Even when we no longer work in
Academe, our long term goals of contributing to the development of
education in Latin American (especially Mexico) nations and a better
understanding between American and Latin American educators, through
exchanges and faculty development, remains the same.
In the Fall of 1999 we returned to Mexico, to renew our contacts and
plan future activities with our Mexican colleagues. We visited the USIS
offices and ITAM, in Mexico City and UDLA, in Puebla and made contacts
with other provincial institutions in Veracruz and Baja California.
The possibility of giving several faculty development workshops
in Mexico, sponsored by USIA and the interested institutions came up.
In the Winter of 1999-2000 again SUNY FACT Committee granted our Project
four half-scholarships to the CIT2000 (contingent on our finding the funds
for the other four halves). Three of the scholarships were
funded: by the Mexican Cultural Institute in New York
City and the CONAHEC (Consortium of North American Higher Education
Collaboration) and the Jose Alonso and the Juarez-Lincoln-Marti project.
The USIS-Mexico (now US State Department) selected the Mexican candidates
to attend the CIT2000 Conference in Buffalo.
In the spring of 2000, Dr. Romeu obtained a Speaker Specialist Grant
from the US State Department, to deliver a faculty-development, one
week-long, workshop at UDLA, Puebla, and a two-day one, at the Hispano
American University in Mexico City. In addition, Dr. Romeu gave presentations
at ITAM and ITESM and met with several organizations to plan for further
workshops in the summer, through the new program that the Project was
starting in the area of faculty development to smaller institutions.
In the Summer of 2000, using the stipend funds paid by the Department of State
and other contributions frmo the Project, Dr. Romeu taught another week-long,
faculty development workshop, via Internet, to the Universidad Veracruzana
university system (campuses in Xalapa, Cordova, Poza Rica and Coatzalcoalcos)
from the main campus in Xalapa. Mrs. Zoila Romeu, an experienced language
teacher, also developed a short "conversatorio" with UV faculty in the areas
of Education. A Second, one-day workshops also on infusion of technology in
math and science and its corresponding classroom administration techniques,
was taught at the Universidad de Chapultepec, in Mexico City, by request
from this institution and as a corresponding courtesy to the Cultural Attache
of the American Embassy, who has often supported this program.
In the Spring of 2001, again the Project requested and obtained scholarships
from SUNY FACT, to attend the COT Conference in SUNY Geneseo. The other half
scholarships were generously provided by the Executive Director of the US
Fulbright Association, by the Cultural Institute of the Mexican Consulate
in New York and the Juarez Project. Again the office of the US Cultural
Attache in Mexico City helped with the selection of candidates and with the
generous contribution of one air fare for one of the four scholars.
In the Summer of 2001, lacking travel funds and time, the Project was not
able to develop any workshop. We did receive, from several ASA colleagues,
several boxes of books of statistics and science that we intend to provide
to the libraries of small, provincial institutions in Mexico. But we were not
able to send them because of lack of funding. We approached several previous
donors but found that our current status prevented them from providing us
with the funds to send the books to Mexico even in" M-Bags". This situation
triggered a serious rethink of our Project and its current state.
We realized that the Juarez Lincoln Marti has attained a degree of develop-
ment that requires its institutionalization. We need to acquire the legal
and tax status that allows us to pursue and obtain the support and grants
that may allow us to develop the programs that we have. Hence, we have
started the process of "incorporation" of the Juarez-Lincoln-Marti as a
New York "nonprofit" (e.g. 503(c) tax status) corporation.
If the reader of these lines has any suggestions on how to further advance
our Project goals please do not hesitate to send us an
email.
Thank-you