草榴社区

, Associate Professor in Soil-Plant Interactions in the has been leading study abroad programs to Australia, Argentina, and Spain since 2017.

• Why do you lead programs?
  • I鈥檒l let Mark Twain explain: 鈥淭ravel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.鈥�  It鈥檚 also fun!
• What would you say to faculty that are considering leading a program?
  • Do it!  Come talk to any of us and we can help with getting a study abroad program off the ground.
• What have you learned by leading programs?
  • What haven鈥檛 I learned.  Geesh, there are so many cool aspects of agriculture that we don鈥檛 see in the U.S.
• What has been your favorite program that you have led?
  • Don鈥檛 make me choose.  Any of them where I get to travel with Sergio and Ebby.
• What has been most memorable about leading a program? General or specific.
  • Students (and myself) seeing snail farming, which is surprisingly a lot like cow/calf operations in the US, and trying escargot for the first time.
• What do you like to do in your free time?
  • Listen to or play music, play cards or board games, mountain bike
• Is there a place that you would like to lead a program, but haven鈥檛?
  • Senegal, India, or Scotland
• Why should students study abroad?
  • Once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.  This is a rare time in your life when you can freely travel, make friends, and learn all at once!  I wish I had the opportunity when I was an undergrad.
• How would you encourage students to study abroad?
  • It helps refine the knowledge you have about the world and your place in it.  It鈥檚 also fun!