Diversity
Circles Being Launched. Led by Outreach Program
Manager Barbara McClure-Lukens, a new
coalition of agencies  is
working to establish a Diversity Circles project in
our community. Diversity Circles are small-group, democratic,
peer led, highly participatory discussions that give
people the opportunity to make a difference in their
communities. Coalition members will participate in an
intensive Diversity Circles Orientation and Organizing
Clinic sponsored by Outreach on Friday, June 6. The
session will be held on campus and led by Fran Frazier,
a national trainer with the Study Circles Resource Center
(SCRC), Pomfret, Connecticut. The SCRC is a project
of the Topsfield Foundation, Inc, a private, nonprofit
nonpartisan foundation dedicated to advancing deliberative
democracy and improving the quality of public life.
The local agencies partnering with Outreach and Extension
include the Multicultural Center of Greater Green Bay,
the YWCA, Brown County UW-Extension, Northeast Wisconsin
Technical College, the Hmong Association of Green Bay,
NEWIST, and the Northeast Wisconsin African American
Association. Juliet Cole, assistant
director of the UWGB Institute for Learning Partnership,
is co-convener of the group.
 College
Credit in High Schools. Growing attention has
been paid in recent years to programs and policies aimed
at better preparing high school students for college,
as well as at accelerating student progress toward college.
Two hundred ninety five of the best and brightest seniors
in area high schools participated in the UW-Green Bay
high school credit outreach program this year. Courses
were offered in Bonduel, Clintonville, Shawano, Sturgeon
Bay, Wausaukee and Wrightstown school districts. Outreach
Program Manager Bob Skorczewski is
working with Professors Catherine Henze,
Joan Thron, Carl Battaglia,
John Lyon and Greg Davis
to introduce four new courses in several districts next
year. New districts joining the program are Goodman-Armstrong
Creek, Little Chute, Menominee Indian and Seymour.
 Summer
Camps Update. Online registrations are the
wave of the future! Camps director Mona Christensen
has found that the parents of elementary age students,
feel more comfortable registering online than they do
with any other registration method. To date, 425 people
have registered for summer camps this year on Outreach's
secure site. To check it out, go to http://www.uwgbsummercamps.com
-- and register your child (or grandchild) for a camp!
More. Nearly 40 UWGB students are working as on-site
counselors for UWGB summer camps this summer. “We
have found the coolest summer camp counselors on the
planet,” says Christensen. These college students
will supervise all evening activities for the thousands
of campers who will make UWGB their temporary home away
from home. Many counselors are education students and,
in addition, range from social work to computer science
majors. “These students will be responsible for
keeping the campers safe and, at the same, providing
loads of fun for the young people,” says Christensen.
“The best place to be this summer? On campus for
a summer camp!”
 Assistance
For Displaced Workers. In response to plant
closings and layoffs, UW-Green Bay’s Small Business
Development Center has been involved in area workshops
for displaced workers interested in starting their own
businesses. The SBDC conducted seminars at the Suring
Job Center for former employees of Even Flo and in Manitowoc
for employees of Mirro. More SBDC workshops and one-on-one
counseling are being arranged through local organizations.
"Many of the people just don't want to leave the
area and are searching for ways to support their families,”
says SBDC Director Doug Gjerde. “Local
job prospects are not good so they are exploring whether
owning their own business would enable them to stay
where they have lived and worked their whole lives.
We are being asked to be ready for more layoffs and
plant closings by other state agencies working with
other companies that are about to layoff employees or
close."
Wisconsin
Teachers Connect Classrooms to Cutting-Edge Science.
Twelve Wisconsin science teachers earned college credit
from UWGB and returned to their communities earlier
this spring, eager to share the many resources, activities,
and knowledge they received at Marshall Space Flight
Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Teachers learned how
 to
design engaging, real-world learning challenges for
their students. To offer this opportunity, Education
Outreach Program Manager Carmen Leuthner
partnered with Space Education Initiatives, a Green-Bay
based non-profit company specializing in earth and space
science curriculum development and teacher training.
Teachers toured both the Payload Operations Control
Center and the Environmental Control Life Support System
for the International Space Station. After a presentation
by one of NASA’s historians, teachers traveled
to the Rocket Test Stand Facility. Climbing halfway
up the 18-story structure, teachers viewed the largest
and most historical test stand where rockets were fired
in the Space Program’s heyday. Teachers were also
able to observe test stand preparations for the investigation
of the foam insulation in question in the Colombia tragedy.
This trip was made possible by the Wisconsin Initiative
for Math, Science, and Technology (WIMSTE) program,
a project funded by NASA and the Department of Education
to improve math, science, and technology scores using
a topic that has always excited young people: space.
Congressman Mark Green and Senator Herb Kohl secured
funding for WIMSTE.
 Learning
in Retirement Sets Record. A record number
– 615 -- retired and semi-retired folks joined
LIR this year and took advantage of nearly 100 courses
and study groups offered by this peer-led, membership
driven organization sponsored by Outreach. Retired professors
including Arthur Cohrs, Jack Day, Fritz Fischbach,
Elmer Havens, Elaine McIntosh, Tom McIntosh, Mike Murphy,
Paul Sager, Lee Schwartz and Bob Wenger
participated as LIR members and/or led courses; current
faculty members David Damkoehler, Jeff Entwistle,
Curt Heuer, David Littig, James Marker, Illene Noppe,
Dean Rodeheaver, Jerrold Rodesch, Ron Stieglitz
and Christine Style taught sessions
or courses for the group.
|
