SPAN: September/October 2008

R

amadan in Rockville, Maryland, started with a charity fundraiser by the local Indian Muslim community. Though informal Saturday night dinners among families will follow, as will a big Eld celebration in October, tonight it's all about good food and a good education.

A local restaurant has provided a feast of mutton curry, phirni and other delicacies in order to raise money for primary schools built by the Association of Indian Muslims of America for under-privileged Muslim children in India. The association holds a fundraising dinner like this every year, says member Alif Manejwala. It takes about $25,000 a year to add another grade to the schools, he says, and they hope to raise a bulk of that with this fundraiser. ~efore the m~al, an azaan is recited and the community prays together In the cafeteria of a local government building, where the dinner is held. A meeting to plan new events follows, and prominent members of the community are invited to speak. Children play and teenagers solicit advice about going to college. Just another evening for a solid community keeping its ties with India, and looking forward to a future in America.

iwali at the BAPS (Bochasanwasi Shri Akshar Purushottam) Shri Swaminarayan Mandir in Houston, Texas, is celebrated with fireworks displays, children's programs and diya lighting-not to mention wonderful feasts. Texas is a state known in the United States for doing everything on a big scale. With a large Indian population, Diwali celebrations in Houston are a grand affair.

Celebrations include an elaborate ceremony where an array of vegetarian food is arranged in tiers in front of the deities, and special devotional songs are sung. Throughout the United States, similar ceremonies are held at the more than 50 other BAPS temples, from San Francisco, California to Sf. Louis, Missouri.

September/October 2008

Front cover: Students at the Rice UniversitY campus.

Courtesy Rice University.

SPAN Publisher: Editor-in-Chief: Editor: Associate Editor: Urdu Editor: Hindi Editor: Copy Editors.

Art Director: Deputy Art Directors: Editorial Assistant: Production/Circulation Manager: Printing Assistant: Business Assistant: Research Services:

2

Larry Schwartz Lisa A. Swenarski de Herrera Laurinda Keys Long Deepanjali Kakati Anjum Naim Giriraj Agarwai Richa Varma Shah Md. Tahsin Usmani Hemant Bhatnagar Khurshid Anwar Abbasi Qasim Raza Yugesh Mathur Rakesh Agrawal Alok Kaushik Shaji T Kommery Bureau of Inlernational Information Programs, The American Library

34 . Travel: Roadside Curiosities

By Lauren Monsen

By Bhavani Tirumurti

Top Graduates Line Up to Teach the Poo

By Tamar Lewin

20 . u.s. Campus Like a Mock Work Environment

6 . Teach For America

By Praveena Lakshmanan

23 . The India Experience: Understanding

By Moulik D. Berkana

Commerce

By Deepanjali Kakati

38 . A Half Century of Service

By Domenick DiPasquale

44 .Making

History Along the Way

By Domenick DiPasquale

• What Makes a Good Vice President

By Michelle Austein

.Party Onl

54 .The First Ladies

By Richa Varma

• The Indian American Voter

8 • Are Boys in Crisis? Will Single-Sex Classrooms Help?

10 11

By Jeffrey Thomas

• Let's Read Together

By Vaidehi iyer

• International Admissions to US Colleges and Universities

By Dale Edward Gough

13

By Shaheena Parveen

15

• An American Chooses Graduate School Semester in India

By Erica Lee Nelson

16

• The Genius Next Door

By Vaidehi Iyer

18

By Caitlin Fennerty

24 .Zipcar:

Ecofriendly Driving

By Burton Bollag

26 Unzipped By Chadwick Matlin 28 • America's Oddball Museums

By Lauren Monsen

• Cultural Connections

.Learning How to Think, Analyze and Ask Questions By Caitlin Fennerty

By Kelly Bronk

58 59

On the Lighter Side .Achievers: Lena Khan

By Serena Kim

60

Letters to the Editor

http://span .state. gOY Contactus editorspan@state.gov Forsubscriptionsor addresschange:

subscri ptionspan@state.gov Published by the PublicAHairsSection,AmericanCenter,24 KasturbaGandhi

Marg,NewDelhi 110001 (phone:23472000), on behalfot theAmerican Embassy,NewDelhi. Printed at ThomsonPressIndiaLimited, 18/35, Delhi MathuraRoad,Faridabad,Haryana121007. Opinions expressedin this58-page magazinedo notnecessarilyreflecttheviewsor policiesof the US Government

* Articleswitha starmaybereprintedwith permission.

ContactProgramAssistantMadhuriSehgalat011-23472289or editorspan@state.gov

A LETTER FROM

THE

PUBLISHER n Indian woman attends a U.S. university on a sports scholarship? Why not? A math and science whiz with U.S. colleges beating down his door picks the one that will let him take poetry and piano classes? A young woman considering the medical field spends her first four university years reading only the world's great books? Some of the brightest and best American graduates put off engineering, business, medical and legal career paths so they can teach at the country's neediest schools for two years?

What's going on? It's the new world of different choices and different roads to education. And we are celebrating this diversity of ideas and opportunities with articles by young Indians and Americans in SPAN's annual education-focused issue.

Americans and Indians share a passionate commitment to education. We realize it opens all the doors of the future for us, our children and our nations. We believe it is desirable that every child is educated and yet, in both of our countries, that is not yet happening. This is why we've opened this issue with articles on the Teach For America program, which has its counterpart in the recently born Teach For India.

The program lures graduates with top academic credentials to compete against each other for the chance to share their valuable knowledge with kids who have had fewer opportunities, To give back to their country, to gain some maturity before making major life choices, to learn something different about conditions outside their experience and to impact someone else in a positive way are among the attractions. Wendy Kopp developed the idea for Teach For America as part of her senio[ thesis at Princeton University, then got corporate and philanthropic sponsors, and help from a governmental organization, Americorps. She is sharing these new approaches as a member of the executive board of Teach For India.

We explore another kind of alternate route in "America's Oddball Museums" and "Roadside Curiosities," travel articles written with humor by Lauren Monsen, The road trip, an icon of American culture representing the enjoyment of space and freedom, is celebrated in books, literature, poems and songs.

Americans are about to make some big choices on who will be running our government for the next four years. To acquaint you with the two principal candidates for president, Domenick DiPasquale has written profiles of John McCain and Barack Obama, while Michelle Austein has explained the history of vice presidents, and Caitlin Fennerty tells about the roles of Indian Americans in the elections to be held in November.

We hope you'll read all the articles in SPAN, and let us know which ones you like best and why. Send us your comments on the card just before this page and you might win a prize!

A

o ra oates • IDe lID F

or a surprisingly large number of bright young people [in the United States], Teach For America-which sends recent college graduates into poor rural and urban schools for two years for the same pay and benefits as other beginning teachers at those schools-has become the next step after graduation. It is the postcollege, do-good program with buzz, drawing those who want to contribute to improving society while keeping their options open, building an ever-more impressive resume and delaying 10ng-telIDcareer decisions.

This year, Teach For America drew applications from [16 percent of the senior class at Spelman College in Georgia, 11 percent of Yale University's in Connecticut, 10 percent of Georgetown University's in Washington, D.C., and 9 percent of Harvard University's in Massachusetts. The group also recruits for diversity, and this year 28 percent of the From The New York Times. Copyright Š 2005 The New York Times. All rights reserved.

eac incoming members are nonwhite].

All told, a record [24,718] recent college graduates applied to Teach For America this year.

Teaching does not pay much. It is not glamorous. And the qualifications of most young people going into the field are less than impressive ....

[According to an April 2008 survey by the California-based Panetta Institute, a nonpartisan center for the study of public policy, the percentage of students interested in teaching in a public school has declined from 45 percent in 2006 and 36 percent in

2007, to just 31 percent this year.]

But then there is Teach For America, whose members typically have top academic credentials, experience with children and determination to get results.

Teach For America officials see their recruiting success as a sign of the post-9Ill generation's commitment to public service, and to improving the quality of education for low-income children. "The application numbers we're seeing reflect college students' belief that education disparities are our generation's civil rights issue," says Elissa Clapp, Teach For America's senior

Teach For America in a Capsule 29: Number of urban and rural regions served.

More than 6,000: Number of corps members.

More than 14,000: Number of alumni.

More than 425,000: Number of students impacted annually.

Nearly 3 million: Number of students reached since inception.

Source: http://Www.teachforamerica.org/abouVour_history.hlm

Above: Teach For America corps member Leslie-Bernard Joseph teaches in a Bronx school in New York City in 2007. vice president of recruitment.

Many corps members talk passionately about the importance of education, and the need to close the achievement gap between white and minority students. But part of Teach For America's allure is that it is only a two-year commitment and a way to put off big life decisions, like where to live and what career to choose, decisions that people in their 20s are delaying ever later in life.

"I don't think very many of my peers know what they want to do," says Nathan Francis, who graduated from Yale [in 2004], was accepted to Teach For America, but declined the offer because he was unsure that he could be a good teacher for disadvantaged students after nothing more

For more information: Teach For America http://www. teachforamerica.org/ Focusing on America's future www.panettainstitute.org/ The National Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research www.caldercenter.org/

Top: Curriculum Specialist Martin Winchester conducts a Teach For America training session in Houston, Texas.

Above: Elizabeth Venechuk, a third grade teacher at Powell Elementary School in Washington, D.C. and Teach For America participant, during a mathematics class.

than the group's summer training. "A lot of people who just graduated are looking for things to do, so it seems very appealing to have something to do that's worthwhile and short term and gives you two more years to think about your career."

In fact, Yael Kalban, who helped organize campus recruiting as a senior at Yale [in 2004] ...says that even a two-year commitment was daunting to many of her classmates.

"We'd tell people we thought they'd be great, and they'd say they didn't know if they were ready to commit two years," she says. "So we would get alums to come in and say they'd done Teach For America, and now they were in medical school, law school or architecture school, and that those two years weren't that much, and had actually helped them get into those schools."

Although [two-thirds of] Teach For America alumni remain involved with education ...many of the applicants do not plan a long-term teaching career. In fact, many also interview for competitive jobs with investment banks and management consulting firms.

"This is a generation that thinks a lot about keeping their options open," says Monica Wilson, [associate] director of employer relations at Dartmouth College's Career Services. "For students who want to look for an alternative to the corporate world, Teach For America offers a highprofile alternative. They put on a real strong marketing blitz, and they are very much a presence on campus."

Rachel Kreinces first heard of Teach For America as a sophomore at the University of Pennsylvania. She had been thinking of going straight to law school, but after starting a writing program for middle school students in Philadelphia, she was intrigued by the prospect of teaching for two years.

After taking a five-week training program over the summer, Kreinces taught sixthgrade special education students at Public School 123 in Manhattan in New York, arriving at 7:30 a.m., prepared to offer as many tutoring hours and after-school meetings and gimmicks as it takes to help them learn. Before school started, she bought gold envelopes and cut out round ''I'm a champion" medals for each student.

"In training ...we watched videos of this incredible teacher," she says. "He had this Mission: Impossible theme going, and his

kids were clamoring for more homework, and we were all sitting there thinking, 'How can I be this kind of teacher?' And my idea was this Classroom of Champions. I want so much for these kids to do well."

Teach For America grew out of a senior thesis by Wendy Kopp, a Princeton student, proposing a national teacher corps.

Kopp quickly got seed money from ExxonMobil, then, with a small staff, began a grass-roots recruitment campaign that yielded 500 fledgling teachers, who were placed in six regions in 1990. Teach For America has grown rapidly, with backing from corporate partners, philanthropists interested in education reform and Americorps, which provides the teachers with $9,450 after two years, to repay education loans or to pay for future schooling.

Since 2001, the group has benefited from the same surge of interest that has brought record numbers of applications to longestablished groups like the Peace Corps.

Teach For America is a growing presence in many school districts, including New York City's, which has about [1,000] of the group's members this year. [This fall,] Teach For America has about 3,700 [new] teachers teaching in [29] areas, from Los Angeles and Baltimore to the Arkansas Delta and the Pine Ridge Lakota Sioux reservation in South Dakota. The group only operates in regions certified as high need by the federal government and willing to employ teachers who lack certification.

As much as anything, Teach For America is a triumph of marketing. The group, based in New York City, recruits on more than [400] campuses and spends about a quarter of its nearly [$120] million budget on recruitment and selection ....

"It's very intensive recruiting, to meet the goals Teach For America sets for us," says Mike Kalin, who was a Harvard recruiter his junior and senior years, and taught in the South Bronx in New York City. "Some of my friends might have thought I was a little too intense my first year. There were some individuals we really wanted to go after because we thought they'd be great. It helped that the class president, for the previous two years, had joined Teach For America."

It has also helped, on all campuses, that Teach For America now has a track record: [In March 2008, the Washington, D.C.-based Urban Institute and the Center

Copyright Š The New Yorker Collection 2004 David Sipress from cartoonbank.com. All rights reserved.

for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research released a study that looked at the impact of Teach For America corps members on high school students. It found that, when compared with non-Teach For America teachers, including those who are fully certified in their subject areas, Teach For America teachers have a positive effect on high school students' achievements.]

A 2005 study of Houston, Texas, student achievements by Linda DarlingHammond of Stanford University and others [had] found that although Teach For America teachers performed as well as

other uncertified teachers, their results did not match those of certified teachers.

Teach For America officials contended that the study was flawed.

While most parents do not know that their children are being taught by Teach For America members, some New York City principals say, they love having Teach For America members assigned to their schools. ~ Tamar Lewin is a national correspondent with The New York Times.

Please share your views on this article. Write to editorspan@state.gov

Youth Exchange and Study (YES) program participants attend a reception at the residence of U.S. Deputy Chief of Mission Steven J. White in New Delhi prior to their departure for the United States in August. YES is a high school exchange program funded by the US. Department of State.

An American diplomat in India recounts his stint at a New York school.

E

effort finally resulted in Jose becoming a better reader, and even enjoying expressing himself through his journal I wanted to make a positive difference in a very challenging work environment, and Jose's turnaround was inspiring to me, personally and professionally. Practically, and with keeping in mind a host of future career options, the teaching profession has many transferable skills: public speaking, planning, even diplomacy! Before I began my work as a teacher of English, I imagined I would spend my days explaining the parts of speech, how to write a paragraph, how to read and respond to a text. However, it quickly became clear that classroom management was my biggest challenge: If the classroom environment is not conU.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings and first lady Laura Bush visit first grade students at the Martin Luther King ducive to learning, educational Elementary School in Washington, D.C. to mark the 10th goals are difficult to achieve. During anniversary of Teach For America Week in April 2008. my two years, I struggled to become ,~ a good teacher, manifesting the right , '~ combination of substance, disci~ pline, bluff and compassion. I am ~ not sure if I ever attained this lofty ~ goal, but I am convinced that ยง through the Teach For America proo ~ gram, I made a positive difference in the lives of some, and perhaps most, of my students.

Core Teach For America values hold that a good education levels the playing field of life, and that every student deserves a quality education.

In its own way, Teach For America is a success story in educational reform in the United States, and stands as a model to be emulated. Since its founding, Teach For America has become one of the most sought after postgraduate programs for students of America's top universities.

ven before I joined the U.S. foreign service, I had already served for two years in a "hardship post"-a junior high school classroom at Theodore Roosevelt Gathings Middle School in the Bronx, perhaps the grittiest of New York City's five boroughs. After earning my Bachelor's degree from the University of Oregon, I was selected by the Teach For America program to teach English in an underserved, under-resourced, understaffed urban school district for two years. I earned a beginning teacher's salary which, in New York, sometimes made it hard to make ends meet, even living in Spartan frugality Each school day I taught English to more than 30 seventh and eighth grade

students for gO-minute class periods. Challenging? Clearly. Difficult?

Immenselyl So, why did I, and thousands of other recent college graduates, forego more lucrative and immediately attractive career options?

In my own case (and I believe for a good many of my Teach For America peers), the answer can be encapsulated in one word Jose. All teachers have had a Jose in their classrooms.

The progress Jose made over the course of nine months was impressive. A 14-yearold in seventh grade (about two years behind the average age of his peers), he had difficulty reading and initially dismissed the class and my efforts as "mad wack." Months of

What makes the program so popular? Idealism is a prime motivator of American youth; a commitment to give back to the community is strong. In the United States, 62 percent of college students are involved in some kind of volunteer work.

Teach For America represents an ideal venue to channel this energy and enthusiasm. The challenge of the difficult, if not the impossible, is very real The program sends enthusiastic young college graduates to underserved districts throughout the United States where they work to inspire students to learn in spite of the many hurdles they come across in their personal and academic lives.

In fact, many Teach For America alumni continue teaching beyond the two-year commitment, while others have gone on to be administrators or open their own schools.

Learning is not a one-way process, and I also discovered a lot from my firsthand experiences in the Bronx. I learned about the challenges facing America's educational system, the day-to-day difficulties of the urban poor, and how a spirit of service or volunteerism can make a positive difference in a needy community. Perhaps most importantly, from Jose I learned more about how education can foster social justice, empowering young people with the ski lis they need to succeed. I wi II carry that lesson with me the rest of y _m__Iife_. ~ Moulik D. Berkana is assistant cultural affairs officer at the U.S. Consulate in Kolkata.

Please share your views on this article.

Write to editorspan@state.gov

ould Teach For America, one of the greatest mass movements in America's education history, work as brilliantly in India?

Well, a group of young Indian education luminaries thought so and explored the feasibility of adapting this movement to the Indian context. They reached out to Wendy Kopp, co-founder and chief executive officer of Teach For America for support and invited her to visit India.

"What I saw on that trip showed me that the time for Teach For India is now-the leaders among college graduates will jump at the opportunity, and there will be allies for this idea within education, government, and the private and philanthropic sectors," says Kopp.

Teach For India will roll out its first batch of 100 highly talented graduates and young Indian professionals in June 2009. "Teach For India has a compelling potential to have an impact in the lives of some of India's most disadvantaged children while also marshalling the talent and energy of India's future leaders against its enormous disparities," says Kopp, who is an executive board director at Teach For India.

Like thousands of their counterparts in America, Teach For India graduates will postpone their careers and head for some of India's poorest and most challenging schools, hoping to give the best possible education to the least advantaged children. Full-time, for two years.

Teach For India would utilize the best experiences of Teach For America, says Shaheen Mistri, who is leading the initiative in India. "Its mission is to create a movement of leaders who will work to end educational inequity in India.

To this end ... TFI will need to find solutions that are India-specific, adapting to the local context and culture," Mistri says.

While the graduates are not required to have a teaching degree to participate in the program, they become salaried teachers for the two-year period. But before placement in schools, they would be

W

required to participate in intensive training to help prepare them for the classroom.

Teach For India teachers would receive the same salary as a regular teacher at that position and experience plus a stipend for housing and transportation. But while Teach For America serves as a placement organization, with corps members becoming employees of the local school district, Teach

For India would be directly paying all or a portion of the teachers' salaries.

Teach For India is financially supported by the Texas-based Michael & Susan Dell Foundation. It has some individual donors, too, though there is a lack of corporate sponsors at the moment. Teach For India says it is actively pursuing the type of business sponsorships which provide much of the funding for the American program.

According to the United Nations, a third of all Indians are illiterate and perhaps 42 million children, aged 6 to 10, do not attend school. Mistri says she expects that the program will "champion the importance of a great teacher and make teaching inspirational."

Teach For India will also conduct outreach to parents, school administrators and other key stakeholders to gamer support for the program.

Initially launching in Mumbai and Pune in Maharashtra, Teach For India hopes to gradually place 2,000 highpotential college graduates in at least a dozen urban and rural schools by 2013.

India has a lot to learn from Teach For America, which has come to be regarded as a program that attracts only the best and brightest.

In fact, Kopp does not harbor any doubts about replicating Teach For America's success in India. "Today, Teach For America is one of the largest interventions in the public education system, reaching [about] 500,000 students with 6,000 teachers," she says. "Teach For America alumni are at the center of the education reform movement-they are leading school systems, hundreds are running high-performing schools in lowincome communities as principals, and others are winning recognition as exceptional experienced teachers, pioneering new solutions as social entrepreneurs .. .I realize that this model could have a similar, and very possibly, greater impact in India." hUp://www.teachforindia.org/

~

Are Boys in Crisis? Will Single-Sel Educators challenged by gender gap in achievement.

o-education for decades has been considered as American as apple pie. At the higher education level, there were more than 200 single-sex colleges for women in 1960, but today there are fewer than 60. Of the 250 all-male colleges in the mid-1960s, only a few remain entirely male today.

On the primary and secondary level, only private and parochial schools have offered single-sex classrooms until recently, but that is beginning to change. Where only II public schools offered single-sex classrooms six years ago, in fall 2008, around 500 will, according to the National Association for Single Sex Public Education, a group that sees them as beneficial to both boys and girls.

The reason for renewed interest in single-sex classrooms: a vocal minority of educators, psychologists and parents perceives boys and young men as not doing as well as their female counterparts and perhaps even being in crisis.

A striking gender gap in educational achievement has emerged since the mid1990s. A study released in 2006 by the American Council on Education found that, since that time, the percentage of white women with bachelor's degrees has continued to increase-a trend that began in the 1960s-while the percentage of similarly educated white men has remained essentially flat. Among African Americans, the group with the largest

C

~ ~ ~ ~ a:

gender gap, males saw some progress with their share of enrollment rising from 37 percent in 1995-96 to 40 percent in 2003-04.

About 33 percent of young women in the age group of 25 to 29 years had a bachelor's degree or more in 2007, compared with 26 percent of their male counterparts. Except in a few fields such as engineering and computer sciences where males remain dominant, females are earning an increasing percentage of degreessix in 10 of the degrees in the biological sciences and more than three-quarters of the degrees in such fields as education and psychology.

At the primary and secondary level, boys are more than 50 percent more likely than girls to repeat grades in elementary school, much more likely to drop out of high school, and twice as likely to be identified with a learning disability,

according to the U.S. Department of Education. Three-quarters of girls graduate from high school, while only twothirds of boys do; an Urban Institute study estimates that more black girls graduate from high school than black boys.

However, a recent report on gender equity in American education discounted talk of a "boys' crisis," finding both American boys and girls have made remarkable strides in education, and that there is no evidence that the gains made by girls have come at the expense of boys.

The critics maintain such a crisis exists not just in the United States but in many countries. Single-sex classrooms are at least part of the answer, they say.

"Single-sex classrooms can advantage girls without disadvantaging boys, and vice versa," says Leonard Sax, a physician and psychologist who has urged teachers to be more aware of gender differences in

lassrooms Help? o路

~ Far left: Darius Phifer ~ (left), Travis Brown ~ and Alexander 'l Greene at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School in Atlanta, Georgia. The sixth and seventh grade students are divided by gender at the school.

Left: Southern Leadership Academy Assistant Principal Bill Redmon answers questions during a boys' lunch period.

The Louisville, Kentucky-based school has separated all classes on the basis of gender.

National Association for Single Sex Public Education

are antithetical to what American public education is supposed to be about, which is to bring children of different backgrounds together."

A new groundbreaking study in Early Childhood Research Quarterly found that preschool boys benefit developmentally from being in a classroom that has a majority of girls while they fall steadily behind in learning skills in an all-boys environment. The proportion of boys in the classroom was found to have no effect on the girls' development. This is just one study and involved only preschoolers, but such results suggest that any picture of the optimum learning environment for boys is likely to get more complex rather than simpler. ~

http://www.singlesexschools.org/home.php

Jeffrey Thomas is a writer for America.gov

the classroom. "Gender-blind education leads paradoxically to a strengthening of gender stereotypes, with the result that fewer girls take courses in physics, computer science, trigonometry and calculus," says Sax, who serves as executive director for the National Association for Single Sex Public Education.

Sax cites research indicating boys and girls respond to stress and competition differently. Researchers have also noted the brain develops differently in boys and girls and is wired differently, he says. As a result, while boys and girls can learn the same things, the best ways to teach them

may be quite different, especially when it comes to mathematics and the sciences.

"The real gender gap is not in ability but in motivation-not in what girls and boys can do, but in what girls and boys want to do: specifically, in what they want to learn, and how they want to learn it," Sax wrote in Education Week in June.

Experts such as Richard D. Kahlenberg of the Century Foundation, a public policy research institution, however, oppose separating kids by gender: "Policies that are going to purposely segregate students by race or gender or income or religion

For more information:

U.S. Department of Education study on public single-sex schools http://www .ed.govIrsch slaVeva1/olherIs ing Ie-sex!characIerislics/i ndex.hIm I

Please share your views on this article. Please write to editorspan@state.gov

14-year-old Milena Lurie from Pennsylvania helped set up a library in a Tamil Nadu orphanage.

Let's Read ]0 I ether

he is an American teenager who them, .. and then ask them to read the same stories out themselves, by turns, In this way, lives in Haverford, Pennsylvania, even those who are poor with the English lanContinents away, in the small village guage, are improving," says Selvi, the librarian of Gandharvakottai in Tamil Nadu, a at the orphanage.

"Moral stories, stories from library named after her was opened different lands and cultures, and books with a in June this year. The Milena Lurie Library at lot of pictures, are particularly popular." the Lady Lynn Joyful Home for orphans and Lurie, a 10th grader who wants to work in destitute children is a tribute to this enterprising teenager's efforts to unite different worlds, Lurie mobilized, in a span of six months, no less than 50,000 books, valued at about $2,5 million, She is a volunteer with the Global Literacy Project, Inc" a New Jersey-based nonprofit group dedicated to achieving universal literacy, About 5,000 of the books have been given to the Lady Lynn Joyful Home, and the remainder are reserved for 10 other I I ~£JJ;,q village schools in Pudukottai district, "'How I Spent My Summer Vacation, ' by Lilia Anya, all where Gandharvakottai is located, There rights reserved, which includes the right to reproduce this are plans to start a bookmobile to reach essay or portions thereof in any form. whatsoever, including, the larger community and also train but not limited to, novel, screenplay, musical, television miniseries, home video, and interactive CD-ROM. " teachers in the surrounding areas so that they can teach the children English, Copyright Š The New Yorker Collection 1993 by Mort Gerberg from cartoonbank.com. All rights reserved.

The books donated to the Milena Lurie Library were in Tamil and English, and fashion when she grows up, says, "I am honincluded Tamil-English dictionaries, "Children can borrow books, of course, but I also read to ored to have a library named after me and I am so glad to be helping these wonderful kids and For more information: putting a smile on their faces."

Lurie found out about the Global Literacy Global Literacy Project Project through her mother. "Lady Lynn is one of http://www.glpinc.org/ my mother's closest friends and she told my mom Lady Lynn Joyful Home for children that since I was looking for a community service project, I should open a library in the orphanhttp://irdc-india-uk org/prgJ Ijhc.htm

S

age ... so that's where it all began," she says.

Lady Lynn Forester de Rothschild, an American businesswoman and philanthropist, has worked with her husband through The ERANDA Foundation to financially support the Lady Lynn Joyful Home for children and help nearby villages, plant trees and educate students.

The Global Literacy Project decided to name the library after Lurie in recognition of her effort. "At the tender age of 14, Milena has created an oasis of hope in a region characterized by drought-of education and opportunity," says Kavitha Ramsamy, founding trustee and vice president for outreach at the Global Literacy Project She is also in charge of its India initiatives, "I can say with certainty that we have seen [a] .. positive change since the library opened .... The children are not only enjoying, they are also improving their reading and writing skills," says S. Pitchairaj, director of Integrated Rural Development Center, the organization which administers the orphanage and the library "I have read 10 to 15 books since our library opened," says J. Krishna Kumar, 13, who lives at the orphanage. "I read a story about a boy who gets good marks and is very arrogant Then his classmate scores more and he learns that while it is important to be at the top of the class, it is also important to be humble and kind. I liked this story very much."

Lurie began working on the project in November 2007, designed a flyer to send out a

month later, and started her e-mail appeals in January 2008.

"There weren't really any difficulties but it was hard packaging all of the tens of thousands of books," says Lurie, adding that she never despaired. "My family supported me a lot in this effort. My mom helped me with e-mailing people, and setting up the shipping dates for the books and their packaging. My grandmother donated tons of dictionaries and the rest of my family gave many books for the library."

With a tremendous response from her friends and well-wishers, Lurie was able to collect books on a wide range of subjects.

Disney Books and Scholastic Publishers pitched in, too.

Lurie visited India for the library's opening.

"This was my first visit to India," she says.

"The people are so kind. I talked to all the kids but they did not always know what I was saying. They told me their names and how old they were and what grade they were in."

Lurie and her mother got to know of Global Literacy Project's work in 2006 when they heard how sophomore Christina Vanech, her family and peers at the Pingry School in New Jersey worked with the organization and other schools in the area to collect and ship thousands of books to disadvantaged students in Johannesburg, South Africa. "Literacy stimulates development and creates new opportunities for advancement," says Ramsamy.

The Global Literacy Project was started in the 1990s by a group of young people from different countries who were all students at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey.

It has shipped more than a million books and established libraries in East Africa, Ghana, Nigeria, Tobago and South Africa.

"It is imperative for children and young people to do community service projects, especially when they are as lucky as Milena, to be born having choices," says her mother, Christina Weiss Lurie. "There are a million worthwhile projects out there. It ultimately depends on what excites the young person's imagination. " Milena Lurie loves books herself. "My favorite books are To Kill a Mockingbird, Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice," she says She would like to tell young people who are not literate yet "to start with picture books and make your way to books that have words. It is a real gift being able to read." ~ Vaidehi lyer is a journalist based in Chennai.

and editor

fyou are a student preparing to apply for admission to colleges and universities in the United States, it is important for you to understand the procedures most U.S. institutions will follow in deciding whether to admit you to their program of study.

In other countries, it is usually the ministry of education, or some similar body, that determines the general eligibility of applicants coming from outside their own educational system.

In the United States, each college or university is free to set its own standard for admission and establish its own criteria to determine if a student's academic qualifications meet that admission standard.

The higher the standard, the more selective the college and the harder it is to gain admission. U.S. schools are generally classified as: 1) highly selective; 2) selective; 3) somewhat selective; and 4) open admission (institutions able to admit students regardless of their previous academic performance).

Your previous study records, therefore, may meet the standards at some institutions but not at others.

It is the responsibility of the college or university to review your educational background to determine if you meet the standard required for admission.

Many institutions will have their own staff evaluate or assess your previous study. Other schools might require you to send your academic records to an agency that specializes in providing evaluations of a non-U.S. education. Sometimes an institution will specify a particular agency, or provide you with a list of several agencies from which you can choose. Despite assessing your previous education and providing the institution with their evaluation, these agencies do not make the decision whether or not to admit you. Only the college or university to which you have applied will make the admission decision.

Pay close attention to the instructions on each admission application you submit. If you apply to more than one institution you will probably be required to follow different instructions for each. Do not assume that one institution's requirements are the same as another. • You will need to have an official or attested copy of all of your previous academic records (often referred to in application materials as a "transcript") sent to the institution to which you apply, and to the agency that will review your education.

"Official records" mean that the school where you studied must

I

Indian students interested in receiving educational advice can log on to the United States-India Educational Foundation (USIEF) at http://www.fulbright-India.org/ www.namastestudyusa.com

or visit

Left top: Paula Nirschel, founder of The Initiative to Educate Afghan Women, follows participants Florence Nabiyar and Arezo Kohistani at Roger Williams University in Rhode Island. The Afghan women received scholarships to study at American universities.

Left center: A representative of the Hawai'i Pacific University interacts with students at a U.S. university fair in New Delhi.

Left: Amita Sharma, an educational adviser with USIEF, provides information about studying in the United States to visitors at a university fair in New Delhi.

If you have been educated in a system send a copy of your academic record that uses external national examinadirectly to the institution to which you tions such as Class 12 board examinaapply and/or to the evaluating agency. tions in Inelia, the Baccalaureate from You, as the applicant, should not mail France, or Ordinary and/or Advanced these records to the institution yourself level examinations from the United because then the records might not be considered "official."

Kingdom, you will need to send copies of the results of these examinations.

• Academic records not in English • If you are applying as a fIrst-year will need to be translated. Colleges and student at the undergraduate level (for a evaluating agencies will need to have Bachelor's degree) you may also need the record in both the original language to take certain standardized assessment and the translation. tests usually required of U.S. appli• You will need to pay particular ~t cants, too, such as the SAT or ACT. attention to the instructions regarding Schools will instruct you as to which translation. You might need to have an "...And as the years IIllfold, there's an important lesson 10 remember-you still owe us money." tests to take and how to make arrangeofficial translation, or one by an authorments for testing. ized or licensed translator. Yet, some • Those applying as graduate stuinstitutions and agencies might allow you to do the translation yourself, if you are sufficiently profi- dents (for the Master's degree or PhD) might be required to take the Graduate Record Examination (GRE), or the Graduate cient in English.

Management Admissions Test (GMAT) if applying for an • External examinations are an important part of the process for U.S. institutions to decide whether to admit you to their programs. MBA. The institutions to which you apply will tell you which

« 13~

Cultural Connections Experiencing different languages, religions and lifestyles on a U.S. campus enriches our lives.

HySHAHEENAPARVEEN

iving and studying in the United States is a different experience.

The method of teaching and professors' expectations are different.

The curriculum is diverse, If you are a mathematics major, you can also take classes in art, music, literature and sports. You can earn a degree as well as nourish your interests and hobbies.

The professors are comparatively informal. Each student is assigned an academic adviser. The expectations of the professors are more or less the same as in India-timely completion of assignments, participation in class and at least 98 percent attendance, Some students worry about their accent and back off from interaction.

However, teachers or fellow students do not care about accents as long as they understand you.

You should try to live on campus, at least for the first year, as it gives you a chance to blend in and participate. Some organizations that might interest Indian students are the International Students' Association, the Indian Students' Association, the Muslim Students' Association and the South Asian Association.

When I joined Chatham University in Pennsylvania, there was no association for Muslim students, A few of my friends and I decided to get something started. We got permission from the college authorities and started organizing events in order to spread the message of Islam.

Our first event was an Iftar party to which we invited the college staff and students. The Iftar dinner was followed by a discussion about the significance of Ramadan in Islam, I also organized Diwali and Holi with the International Students' Association. By joining these groups, you can develop strong leadership

L

Students paint a mural recognizing diversity in faith among Muslim and non-Muslim youths, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

and teamwork skills, and make friends.

Sharing a room with another student is an opportunity to explore a different culture. I remember our orientation leaders telling us that we cannot expect our roommates to be our friends. But we can expect them to be good roommates. Cultural differences might create some problems that need to be addressed. It is advisable to resolve them between yourselves. If things get out of hand, the residence assistants are there to help.

In my senior year, my roommate was a freshman. We did not have many things in common and, as my orientation leaders said, we could not become friends. But we were good roommates and both of us compromised a little so that we did not disturb each other.

Food turns out to be a concern for some international students, espe-

International

cially if you are vegetarian Some of the recipes served in my cafeteria contained alcohol. We had to request the chef to label those items. It is a common practice in the United States to offer alcoholic beverages at parties and social events. If you do not drink alcohol, refuse politely and if you like, you can explain your reason as well.

Americans are curious to know about other cultures. Use this opportunity to grow Studying abroad is not all about earning a degree but g _en_r_ic_hl_·n_ _yo_u_r _Iif_e_a_s _w_el_I. ~ Shaheena Parveen, a graduate in psychology from Chatham University in Pennsylvania, is doing her masters at lamia Millia Islamia in New Delhi.

students in the United States

http://opendoors.iienetwork.org!?p Online resources for education

= 113743

information

http://www.america. gov/sl/educ-eng Iish/2008/ January!

20080110172400eaifas0.7198755.html standardized tests are required for their graduate applicants and how to make arrangements for testing.

• If English is not your native language, both undergraduate and graduate applicants are required to present the results of an English proficiency test, such as the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). Some universities may waive the TOEFL for Indian students who have studied in English medium schools and have good scores in the Writing section of SAT. Graduate applicants who seek a ~ teaching assistantship may also be ~ required to take the Test of Spoken English ~ as evidence of their ability to teach in English. ;j, • If you need an F-l or M-l (student) ~ visa, or a J-l (exchange visitor) visa, you ~ will need to present evidence that you ~ have adequate financial support for the ~ entire period of your anticipated study. Z Most U.S. colleges and universities will Nicole Buenavantura prepares for her Greek ask you to complete a form regarding your civilization class at New Mexico State . 1 b ac ki ng f or your stu d'JeS, or WI'11 Umverslty . _ f·manCIa tell you what documentation is required. admission for the term you desire, you You will usually have to complete a form will need to have all materials received by outlining the sources of your financial sup- the indicated deadlines. port as well as provide verification for it.

• It is highly recommended that you visit • Deadlines are extremely important! an Education USA Advising Center if there Many U.S. colleges and universities is one close to you. The EducationUSA receive hundreds or even thousands of offices have staff that can provide you applications from international students with information about applying to U.S. each year. In order to be considered for colleges and universities. They also have

I

f

information about specific institutions and can assist you in your search for a school in the United States.

If you have any questions about your application process or what you need to provide, contact the institutions in which you are interested for clarification or assistance.

Dale Edward Gough is the head of international education services of the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers.

first came to India in 2002, a bewildered 20-year-old college student leaving the United States for the first time, to take up an editorial internship in Kochi, Kerala.

My reasons were not very romantic. The main motivation stemmed from India's English media. India was one of the few places in Asia I could work as a journalist without knowing a local language.

My school, the Evergreen State College in Washington state, had a liberal policy on internships, and I received a quarter year's worth of academic credit and returned home to northern California in four months. But India, as it so often does to us restless souls from the West, got under my skin. After finishing my undergraduate degree in journalism, I came back to work as a journalist in New Delhi, married an Indian, and took private lessons in Hindi.

Thus, I became an unofficial student in all things South Asia without having ever stepped into a class on the subject.

But this is set to change soon. And much of the thanks for it are due to SPAN. My husband and I settled in Washington, D.C. in 2007, and while helping him research a story for SPAN, I met Ambassador Karl Inderfurth, a former assistant secretary of state for South Asian affairs, who is now in charge of the graduate program in intemational affairs at The George Washington University (http://www.gwu.edu/index.cfm). He told me about the cooperation agreement the university had signed with Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, allowing for both faculty and student exchanges.

Inderfurth also told me that though some faculty from India had come to Washington to teach, no student from the Elliott School of International Affairs had yet taken advantage of the opportunity to go to Jawaharlal Nehru University. I knew I had to be that first student.

Graduate school is not an automatic next step in the United States after undergt'aduate studies, as it often is in India. It's a big investment (usually ranging from $10,000 to more than $30,000 a year in tuition) and it's a big decision. I had long thought of going to graduate school, and I even took my Graduate Record Examination while living in India, but had no idea where and when I wanted to go.

Luckily, life sometimes gives you a helping hand. The George Washington University's international affairs program is wellrespected, and has the advantage of being

I

U.S. and Indian universities are moving forward creatively with new ways to exchange students, faculty, research and resources. In another first, this American is starting graduate school in Washington, D.C. and completing her degree in New Delhi. located in the U.S. capital. Combined with study at one of the most respected schools in India, it was too good to pass up.

Having worked as a journalist since I was a teenager, I am ready to branch out and try something new. My goal is to find a job where I can work to bring the two countries closer together.

Just as a graduate degree from The George Washington University is a huge boost on my resume in the United States, I believe Jawaharlal Nehru University will provide an important global perspective for my studies and increase my legitimacy as an American with a deep understanding of South Asia. I also plan to complete a research project with the help of its resources and faculty.

People called me crazy when I just applied to one graduate school. But I knew that The George Washington University had everything I was looking for, and I wasn't willing to settle for anything less.

The gamble paid off: I was accepted and began classes toward my degree in international affairs on September 2.

Planning for study abroad is complicated. The George Washington University's international exchange student program

works like many others: It will accept up to 10 academic credits from a foreign university with which it has entered into a partnership. (A total of 40 credits are needed to earn a graduate degree). Thus, I have to schedule my studies carefully to make sure I complete all required core courses before I leave for India during my last semester in graduate school.

During the coming year, I will work to choose a research paper topic, apply for study abroad scholarships, and choose my classes for Jawaharlal Nehru University.

I'll also have to file an application for official acceptance as a foreign student at the university, and arrange my own housing in New Delhi.

If all goes well, I'll be coming to India in 2010, but this time as a confIdent 29-yearold graduate student, returning to a country filled with family and friends. I won't be dependent on just English, and instead will be working to perfect my Hindi. My reasons for arrival are more varied now, but definitely more romantic. I simply love India, and cannot wait to return. ~ Erica Lee Nelson is a freelance writer and graduate student at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

THE

GENIUS NEXT DOOR Rik Sengupta, who was offered full scholarships by seven U.S. universities, is an academic whiz as well as a fun-loving teenager. ik Sengupta is a charnling, extroverted, soccer-crazy, piano-playing teenager with a wicked sense of humor. The 18-year-old from Kolkata also has the distinction of having been offered undergraduate admission with full scholarships to seven top universities in the United States.

The scholarships, ranging from $49,000 to $54,000 a year, would cover tuition, housing, meals, and hugely subsidize the cost of books and personal expenses.

Sengupta ended up choosing to attend Princeton University in New Jersey this fall semester. He says he did not opt for the conventional Indian Institute of Technology route to higher education favored by most Indian students. "I am more of a pure math-theoretical physics sort of guy, and applied science has never been my passion.

"Moreover, I realized that while the IITs might have had very good science

R

and math courses, studying there would mean that I would have to let go of my other worlds altogether," he says. "I would never, for instance, be able to take a course in creative writing or music. But these two are as much a part of my world as mathematics and physics are, so letting go of them was out of the question. And then I explored the option of going abroad for my studies and found out that Princeton was the perfect match for me."

Sengupta, who also got admission offers from Yale University, California Institute of Technology, Massachusetts Institute of

Technology, Duke University, Williams College and Amherst College, says he has modeled himself on one of his favorite scientists, Richard P. Feynman. "Like him, I am serious and intensely focused on whatever I do, but at the same time I am a funloving, outgoing person who loves playing pranks on unsuspecting souls-something I'm sure my blog will attest to."

An aspiring mathematician and physicist, Sengupta says he chose Princeton because not only is it No. I in the 2008 U.S. News and World Report rankings of national universities, but it also has the No. 1 mathematics and No. 2 physics graduate programs.

"I am glad to be a student at a university with which three of my favorite scientists-Albert Einstein, Feynman and John ash-were associated. While studying mathematics and physics at Princeton, I also look forward to taking creative writing courses with eminent authors like Toni

Morrison, a Nobel literature laureate; Joyce Carol Oates; and the Pulitzer-winning poet Paul Muldoon," he says.

Sengupta, who studied at Kolkata's South Point High School, secured a score of 2,380 (out of 2,400) in the SAT reasoning test in January 2007. On the SAT subject tests in May and June 2007, he scored full marks (800) in first and second level mathematics, physics and chemistry, and a 760 in literature. Sengupta's Test of English as a Foreign Language score was 118 out of 120.

Despite such an awe-inspiring academic record, the teenager revels in his lighter side.

"I absolutely love playing soccer, chess, Texas hold' em poker, and hanging out with my friends. I worship Richard Feynman, the

For more information: Rik Sengupta's blog http://thethirteenthdimension. blogspot. com/ Princeton University http://www.princeton. edu/main/

Beatles, Zinedine Zidane and Johnny Depp, among others." Best of all, "I am one of the most popular guys in school, and that is one of my points of pride!"

Sengupta also credits his parents with where he is today. "My parents are both historians," he says. "They taught me how to find the joy in learning, and how to enjoy whatever I did."

"I am a little sad that he will be going away," says Aparajita Sengupta, his mom, "but also glad that he will find his freedom in a place that will nurture him as well as challenge him to the limit."

From early childhood, Sengupta enjoyed cracking math puzzles and gradually "came to appreciate how the magic of patterns lay hidden in literary texts as well, for instance, in Alice in Wonderland. Then, I started playing the piano, and ... perceive(d) patterns in the scales and arpeggios that I had to master. So, in many ways, my passions merged into one another. The worlds of

books, of music, of mathematics became one in spirit."

He also enjoys writing poems, all types of music from European classical to Indian contemporary and American rock 'n' roll, as well as European films and Hollywood film noir. To his eclectic skills must be added magic tricks-especially sleight of hand with cards.

He feels that "every student in India should be given the chance to question received wisdom. Criticality is a quality that, in my opinion, is somewhat missing from the Indian system of education. I can only say that a student should never be afraid to follow his or her real passion, and to make a good gamble or take a calculated risk if he or she feels up to it. For, in the end, to follow one's own passion is the best path to success." ~ Vaidehi Iyer is a journalist in Chennai.

and editor based

Learning How to

, Think, Analyze and Ask Questions l

By CAITLIN FENNERTY

No textbooks. No lectures. Yet, St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, offers the 'b I d . h h. essence 0 f a II era arts e ucatlon t roug Its "great books" curriculum.

F==:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;=:;;;~

he words of Aristotle resonate in my mind as I look out at the lush greenery of the front campus at St. John's College (http://www. sjca.edu/): "Man is what he continually does; virtue then is not an act but a habit." A copy of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics lies open on my lap, my finger still glued to this line. I am astounded at the eloquence of his thought and somewhere deep down have been profoundly touched; I know these words will continue to echo for many years to come.

If we are what we continually do, I am proud to be a Johnnie. Day by day, in this picturesque sea side enclave, my heart and mind are exposed to the thoughts of great writers and thinkers. Engaging in thoughtful discussion over these texts with peers and faculty, I am forced to confront my own unexamined opinions and prejudices. Everyday I find my mind a little freer, my heart more moved, my soul a little more fulfilled.

St. John's is a tiny, four-year, liberal arts college founded in 1696 that is nestled in the heart of Annapolis; a quaint, coastal town that also happens to be the capital of Maryland and home to the US. Naval Academy. Johnnies, as St. John's students call themselves, are a geographically diverse bunch, despite there being only about 500 of us on the Annapolis campus. (There is a sister campus in Santa Fe in the southwestern state of New Mexico.) In the parking lot are license plates from allover North America-from Alaska to Texas to Tennessee-indicating the eclectic group of students who have come to study the distinctive "great books" curriculum offered by St. John's.

These great books are the classics of literature, philosophy, theology, psychology, political science, economics, history, mathematics, laboratory sciences and music that have shaped Western civilization and thinking. The books are read in roughly chronological order, beginning with the philosophers, playwrights, historians, and mathematicians of ancient Greece and continuing to the 20th century. No textbooks are used and there are no lectures; all classes ~ are discussion based. ~ The St. John's graduE ate institute in Santa ~ Fe offers a similar proIE'gram, but focuses on ~ the great texts that shaped the thoughts and traditions of the East, particularly those of China, India and

T

Japan. Students take language tutorials in Sanskrit in order to translate selected short passages from classic texts such as the Ramayana.

St. John's is the true liberal arts experience. The curriculum aims to expose students to the greatest works in the key areas of knowledge in order to cultivate informed thinking that lasts a lifetime. According to the school, these "habits of mind" are "a deepened capacity for reflective thought, an abiding love of serious conversation, and a lasting love of inquiry." Liberal arts colleges in general are sought after by students who desire intimate learning environments where close interaction between faculty and stUdents, and among students themselves, fosters a community of serious discourse.

This describes the St. John's learning environment to a tee small class sizes and a primary emphasis on individualized instruction (there is one teacher for every eight students) forms the basis of the intellectual climate of the college. In classical antiquity, the term liberal arts referred to the proper education to become a free man. (In Latin, lib era means free.) This is the philosophy behind St. John's: Students are made free through liberal education. The school motto is, Facio liberos ex liberis libris /ibraque, which means, "I make free adults out of children by means of books and a balance."

In my first year at St. John's, I have come to believe in an incredibly liberating conviction; there is nothing I cannot learn, and, therefore, there is no path in life I am not free to pursue. At an earlier point in my educational career, I had concluded that I was neither maihematically nor scientifically inclined. In high school I opted for the easier math courses and, believing my brain wasn't built for physics, switched to environmental science in my senior year Had I gone to another college that didn't require it, I doubt that I would have challenged myself in mathematics or sciences again. However, the unified, all-required curriculum at St. John's has helped me to discover that these disciplines are not beyond my intellectual grasp. I have been equally competent at discussing and studying the geometrical theorems of Euclid and Ptolemy, and William Harvey's inquiry into the circulation of the blood, as the poetic dialogues of Plato. Through confidence in my own intellectual capacities, I have broadened the horizons of my intellectual freedom.

As a result, I am now considering a possible future in medicine, a field that never seemed an option before. At the same time, my St. John's education has enhanced my love for philosophy, poetry and theology.

My St. John's education is an experience that I will carry with me throughout my life, not grounded in textbook technicalities or mathematical formulas that will be forgotten in time, but in something far more enduring-Iearning how to think, analyze and ask questions. Armed with this knowledge, I feel I can tackle anything. I am a Johnnie. I discuss, I inquire, I think, and most importantly, I trust my own intellect. What does that make me? I'm not sure yet, but I can't wait to find out. Hopefully anything I set my mind to. An ~ Caitlin Fennerty wrote this article while working as a Public Affairs intern at the American Center in New Delhi.

i

The University of Denver in Colorado met ~ most of my criteria and, most importantly, had a .~ young dynamic coach with whom I established a rapport much before I accepted their offer to ~ join. They also gave me a very generous sports 8 scholarship Once into the U,S college system, Indian students have a lot of adjusting to do. It's probably best for them to get into a college that has a diverse student population, as finding other Indians in a similar predicament helps bonding But I strongly encourage Indians to mix with students of other ethnicities as well, since the average American student is keen to get to know Indian students, who have a reputation of being intelligent and hardworking, College life can be a sobering experience in many ways as one no longer has cooks, maids or drivers to depend on. With independence comes the need to become self sufficient. All hostel students anywhere in the world go through this, but when you college tennis with academics.

Most Indians tend to narrow their search to combine this with your new "alien" environment, some well-known institutions, based on word of with no dosa or idli to fall back on, it becomes diffimouth, They, therefore, consider only a handful of cult. Time and patience will see you through.

In the first year, one can almost expect to fall institutions and neglect others. It is better for students to research the advantages of different uni- seriously sick once (no, I don't want to scare you), lose weight after the first few months and versities based on their individual needs.

Considerations include: Location-west or east become skilled at time management. In addition, it is most important to maintain proper coast; size-smaller colleges allow

.!

Going for the Right Mix It's wise to begin researching early to find an American university with the right balance of course offerings, qualified professors, diverse student population and scholarship opportunities. y the time one selects the universities of one's choice, completes all the necessary paperwork and formalities, buys the cheapest ticket to the United States and finally boards the flight, the feeling is not one of joy, but relief-that all the trouble, the anxiety and the nail-biting wait have finally paid off.

Starbucks, Ben & Jerry's and Taco Bell. Yes, they are all there. But these are not the reasons why an Indian student should study in the United States. These are the add-ons! The real reasons include an atmosphere of academic learning; an unparalleled range of disciplines on offer; the charm of a rich campus life; opportunities to innovate and think differently; and, in my case, the possibility of combining the pursuit of serious

B

more individual attention; private or public-thereby determining the funding available; liberal or conservative-a conservative US. college is equivalent to what we in India may consider liberal; discipline and faculty-some have strengths in specific areas of study and a higher percentage of professors with PhDs; and ~ diversity in the student mix. ~ Researching, analyzing and con- ~ suiting college counselors are good <3 moves, For a head start, begin looking while in Class 11, Being an International Tennis Federation junior player, I looked for a healthy mix of tennis and academics, and some financial support in the form of a scholarship. I first wrote directly to the coaches and got responses from several. The fact that I had attended school for three years in the United States, had played in the U.S. national junior circuit and did reasonably well in my SAT exams helped.

But then, sports scholarship slots are not easy to come by since the coaches are inclined to favor US. players with whom they are familiar, or they go by International Tennis Federation rankings for those from abroad. This is only natural.

accounts so that you know when to call your parents for helpl It's usual for Indians to feel awkward about their lifestyle, especially if one is religious, One doesn't have to wear religion on one's sleeve, but there is no need to compromise one's beliefs or values for the sake of gaining acceptance. The American system sometimes unwittingly tries to convert everyone into its mould, even while it appreciates diversity. Well, that's life but that doesn't mean you give up your culture. ~ Bhavani Tirumurti from Chennai is a sophomore at the University of Denver in Colorado.

Interaction is Imperative

u.s. Campus Uke a he decision to go to school in the United States can have several motivations: to learn the more technical aspects of one's field of study, to build contacts or to switch careers.

Schools usually achieve all of these things but I've realized that the greatest takeaway is a way of thinking.

For me, the reasons for going back to school in the United States included the desire for an independent life, an escape from the past and wanting to define a whole new me.

Education in an American university relies heavily on self-discovery, reflection, open-ended questions and analysis.

My time spent studying economics at Rice University in Houston, Texas, in the summer and fall of 2007 provided me with a wealth of activities and support. I found the classroom and student experience particularly valuable after having worked as a research associate with the politi-

T

cal science department at Rice from October 2006 to June 2007.

The classroom experience A typical U.S. classroom is fairly analogous to a concert. Just as the instruments in an orchestra play in unison, creating harmony, the students and the instructor create a similar synergy. And only this synergy can render a melody, from the multifaceted chemistry between the professor and the students, and among the students. The professors are not only leading thinkers in the fields they teach, but are also approachable and friendly.

Most lectures are discussion oriented.

The students are expected to come prepared with the material assigned for that particular class. The assignments, submission dates, exam information, etc. are clearly charted in the syllabus provided on the first day of class. Students are expected to know about the subject beyond the book. For instance, while writing research papers, there are rules for citing outside

literature; and these scrupulous rules must be strictly followed to avoid plagiarism. Where does one get references?

University libraries subscribe to numerous scholarly journals and data bases, besides newspapers and magazines. Most of these resources are also available online for easy access; students can refer to this virtual library even while working from home at 4 a.m.! I found these e-journals to be a great source of authentic information.

On the American university campus, students are presented with the mock atmosphere of a future work environment where tasks cannot be completed by copying answers from a book. Students are required to select a stance and defend their opinions while simultaneously secondguessing every other opinion that is being aired in the room.

In my class on microeconomic theory, there were numerous times when we were asked to solve economic problems (based on a real-world issue or a hypothetical sit-

uation). We were not only expected to solve the problem but also debate the particular approach each one of us used, and then, in teams, devise the most effective short or long term strategy to tackle the particular issue.

The rigor with which the courses are taught at Rice and the high academic expectations of the school took me to heights I had not thought I could reach, and a lot of value has been added to my

academic and practical expertise in economics.

I had to meet with my course instructor, as part of a self-evaluation process, in spite of receiving good grades. This was a regular routine. Not only are good results expected from students, but they are also expected to learn and understand the whys and hows of various methodologies involved and the spirit of the subject.

The teaching methodology appealed to

me the most. Courses are structured in a way to keep you involved throughout the semester. Submissions and team assignments are due almost every week. By the time you actually reach finals week, more than 80 percent of your grade is already decided. There is a huge emphasis on experiential learning with a focus on the practical applications of what is being taught in the classroom.

My time at Rice was filled

From top left: Architecture students during a class at Rice University; students carry a mock dragon in the academic quad to celebrate the Lunar New Year; students in a reading room at the university's Fondren Library; students in the Rice University Art Gallery.

with hard work followed by intellectual growth every day. You're put in classrooms with people from 20 countries who have all done well in their academic and professionallives and have had varied experiences. At one point I found myself in a discussion with an investment banker from Hong Kong, an American Olympic athlete and a Danish teacher, and we were all talking about the exact same thing: What's the best way to improve the operational efficiency of Amtrak, America's passenger train service? The personal growth that takes place due to exposure to different cultures is immense. The student body at U.S. schools is what makes a fantastic experience, as learning takes place through interaction, not lectures.

Campus life and more Various college events give you an extremely good opportunity to meet fellow students and expand your network. Attending guest dinners, parties, balls and sports events reinforced many of the relationships from my classes and fostered new relationships with others in the community, including industry experts and professionals in economics. In addition, Rice University had a huge green campus. Walking around in the woods allowed me to get away from the hectic schedule of student life.

For more information: Another interesting aspect Rice University is that every U.S. university has its own set of ideals, usu- http://www .ri ce. ed u/ ally manifested in an honor Student life on a U.S. campus code. It prohibits lying, cheat- http:7/amlife.amenca,gov am i18T ing and stealing. To see it up education/student Iife.html close is quite an experience.

At Rice, it was considered normal behavior for a student to leave his laptop, cell phone and wallet lying on a study room table, confident that they would still be there when he got back several hours later.

Some say the camaraderie that arises among students on U.S. campuses occurs because many American universities are in smaller towns and your school friends are also your after-hours friends, or because the harder and more substantial curriculum draws students to work together. I think it's all of these in addition to the personality of the school.

All this, and more, adds up to the U.S. experience, a really great place to study, live and capture memorable moments to cherish for the rest of your life.

A" -------~ Praveena Lakshmanan coordinates teacher development programs for the United States-India Educational Foundation (USIEF) in New Delhi.

The India Experience:

Understanding Commerce

W

hat can a student hoping to someday work in the field of US-India affairs do to gain some work experience? One option is to do an internship in India, a route chosen

by New York-born Tina Thomas.

A student of political science and international studies at Yale University in Connecticut, Thomas worked on market reports during her summer internship with the US. Foreign Commercial Service in New Delhi. These reports analyze business sectors or industries and are given to U.S. firms, to inform them about what is available in India. She also researched and helped put together a report on clean energy.

Thomas, whose parents moved to the United States from Kerala in the 1980s, feels U.S. companies now need to look for different, innovative ways to come to India, besides the more common avenues of IT companies, fast food restaurants and clothing chains.

As examples, she mentions online education and clean energy, two areas she worked on during her month-long internship. "Online edu-

For more information: Yale University http://www.yale.edu!

Internship at Commercial Service in India http://www .buyusa. gov!i ndia/en! internship.html

Tina Thomas added to her knowledge of trade and commerce during an internship with the U.S. Foreign Commercial Service in New Delhi. cation is a phenomenal thing. You can help people who are poor, who are in rural areas, to receive a great education. Those are also things that U.S. universities, companies or colleges should consider investing in because there's a huge market in

India. There are people who want to learn allover India but just don't have the resources ... to go to university," she says.

Sometimes, she says, small businesses are a little timid about stepping into the huge market that is India, but if U.S. firms really want to do business in India, they need to come "and push for their ideas and plans." It is also important, she adds, to understand how the two countries do business differently.

Thomas chose an internship because it is crucial to understand

â&#x20AC;˘....

The U.S. Foreign Commercial Service What It's Doing in India

T

j'

"""'"

~

,

he India office of the U.S. Foreign Commercial Service focuses on increasing U.S. exports to India, particularly from small and medium size companies With offices at the American Center in New Delhi, the consulates in Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata and at satellite locations in Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Hyderabad, its trade specialists assist U.S. firms by providing counseling and advice, information on markets, contacts and trade promotion vehicles.

Part of the U.S. Department of Commerce, the commercial service helps Indian companies, too, by organizing buyer delegations to major American trade shows and by providing a platform to connect with hundreds of U.S. companies seeking international partners The commercial service advocates on behalf of US companies in India, which gives them an edge over other foreign competition and helps them when unanticipated problems arise. Upon requests from U.S. companies, the service also helps resolve trade complaints arising between U.S. and Indian firms. http://www .buyusa.gov/india/en/

commerce and trade for her subjects at Yale. "I don't think I've had much exposure to trade or commerce or economics. This will definitely help me in that," she says.

With plans to go to law school and also do a masters in public policy, Thomas used her time in India to practice Hindi because "it's such a useful and important skill to have. It allows you to connect with so many different people." Adding that there was also a professional aspect to her decision, Thomas, who is fluent in Malayalam, says that she wants to work some day in the field of USIndia affairs and "having a little bit of Hindi under my belt is crucial."

She stays close to her Indian roots through visits to family here every two to three years and through cultural connections such as Bharatanatyam lessons, which she took for 10 years.

Thomas, who will graduate next year, has focused her studies at Yale on the regions of South America and India. "I've studied, researched, and worked in South America already, and so, I wanted to come to India .... 1 don't think my studies in South Asia would have been legitimate or acceptable if I hadn't come to the region itself to work." ~ Please share your views on this article. Write to editorspan@State.gov

Ecofriendly Driving Car-sharing business grows quickly in U.S. cities.

or many city dwellers, owning a car is both a blessing and a curse. Some urbanites get around mostly by public transportation, but occasionally need a car for shopping or for trips out of town.

Maintaining a car is expensive, and finding parking on crowded city streets can be a nightmare.

Two women looked at this problem and saw a business opportunity, as well as a way to help the planet. In 1999, they founded Zipcar Inc., which has grown rapidly to become the world's largest carsharing business.

Driven by high oil prices, Zip car is now averaging 10,000 new members per month, triple the number joining at this time last year.

A new survey claims that at current membership levels, Zipcar will lead to a saving of 16 million gallons of petrol and 150 million pounds of carbon dioxide annually.

Traditional car rental companies rent cars by the day. Car-sharing allows drivers to rent by the hour, and without having to wait in line at a car rental counter. Instead, cars are left at reserved places all over urban areas. Many customers have to walk only a few blocks to pick one up.

Zipcar's founders, Robin Chase, an American, and Antje Danielson, from Germany, got the idea after seeing it in Berlin. "We wanted to take what was a coop, environmental movement in Europe and brand it as something cool and hip," Chase says.

She knew the business would require a sizable investment to develop wireless technology that could automatically keep track of vehicles. The aim was to make reserving a car online almost effortless for users, and cost-free for the company. After coming up with a business plan in January 2000, she spent countless hours trying to find investors interested in this novel idea.

"The biggest challenge was persuading people to finance it," she says. "We didn't fit into an established category. Venture capitalists would always ask me: 'Are you a technology company or a consumer company?'"

Zipcar opened for b siness in Boston, Massachusetts, i~ lurie 2000, with the I slogan, "Wheels wfieq y u ant them."

Analysts say the co a did many things Far left: The electronic Zipcard used by customers to unlock Zipcars. Above: Robin Chase, one of the founders of Zipcar.

Below: A Zipcar parked at Manhattan in New York City.

brilliantly, from creating new wireless technology to marketing that emphasized the environmental benefits of car-sharing.

But the company had chronic difficulties raising cash, and in 2003 its board decided to replace Chase as chief executive. (By then, she had sold her controlling interest.)

In her place, the board hired Scott Griffith, a former executive with the aircraft maker The Boeing Company. .

Griffith attracted more investments and helped solve one of the company's biggest challenges: the low use of cars during the business day, when many members are at work. He did this by making deals to provide vehicles to companies, universities and even some city offices.

In the fall of 2007, Zipcar acquired its largest American competitor, Flexcar.

With the two companies merged, Zipcar now has 5,500 cars in more than 50 cities in the United States, Canada and England.

Griffith said the company plans an aggressive expansion into new cities in the United States and Europe.

The merged company does $100 million in annual business. "Our biggest goal," he said in a recent interview with the Boston Globe, is "to become a billionScott Griffith, CEO of Zipcar Inc., swipes a Zipcard on a car in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

dollar company" in about five years.

Unlike the traditional business model for car rental companies, Zipcar's operations are automated. Its vehicles are equipped with a wireless device that not only tells the company where the car is, but also sends such information as the car's fuel level and the number of kilometers driven.

To use a vehicle, drivers must become Zipcar members by paying a one-time $25 application fee and $50 a year. Zipcar checks with the appropriate motor vehicle department to make sure applicants have good driving records. If they do, they are mailed a credit-card-size Zipcard. Today, Zipcar has almost 225,000 members.

"J want a car that says, 'I've arrived but didn't use

too much gas getting there .â&#x20AC;˘â&#x20AC;˘â&#x20AC;˘

Unzipped <;;

~ ~ '5

High petrol prices threaten the car-sharing model-yet more companies than ever want in on the action.

N

8

y now you've heard some version of this story: Petrol prices rise, industries panic, executives worry about the bottom line, and something has to give-costs go way up, sales stall, product designs change or laymen rebel.

This particular story is about the car-sharing industry, one of the most promising and novel business models to emerge in recent years. ..When this idea began to take hold in the late '90s, it was assumed that car-share users would pay one flat fee for a rental, petrol included. That, of course, was when petrol cost less than $2 a gallon These days, the pricing structure is largely the same, but petrol prices have made the business model more unprofitable than ever. Yet more companies are trying it than ever before.

As the industry leader, Zipcar is taking the brunt of the pain from higher fuel costs. Since its creation

B

in 1999, the company has posted steady growth in members, fleet size and metro areas served, but it's never posted a profit. (It has, though, raised $55 million in funding.) ...

Because the petrol fee is wrapped into the overall rate you pay when you use a Zipcar, the only way the company can compensate for rising petrol prices is by hiking the total cost.

Why not? Several reasons. First, Zipcar's users aren't tremendous petrol guzzlers. Seventy-five percent of Zipsters take the car out on an hourly basis (at usually between $6 and $10 per hour). Those drivers probably aren't re-enacting the Lewis and Clark expedition, so their petrol costs, no matter the price per gallon at the pump, are small. These are high-revenue, low-cost travelers.

Also, the spike in petrol prices has been a double-edged sword for

Drivers reserve a car by telephone or online. A Web site displays which models are available at which reserved parking spaces around the city, and the driver picks one. The process typically takes less than a minute, and prices start at $7.50 per hour. (Petrol and insurance are included.)

To use the car, a driver waves his or her Zipcard in front of a small card reader on the windshield.

If the driver has a valid reservation for that hour with that car, it unlocks and can be driven away with an ignition key that has been left inside. The system discourages theft by disabling the engine if someone tries to use a car without a Zipcard and reservation.

the company-it's hurting their margins, but it's attracting thousands of new customers. The company is growing at three times the rate it was at this time last year, according to Chief Operating Officer Mark Norman. It's averaging 10,000 new customers a month, which is a hefty 4 percent to 5 percent increase for a company with 225,000 total members.

More customers also means a more efficient use of its fleet.

But an increase in revenue doesn't necessarily lead to an increase in profits. Asked whether the increase in petrol prices helped Zipcar's bottom line, Norman dodged and answered that it helped drive awareness of the brand as it went more mainstream. He never said it was helping the company's bottom line ...

So the central problem remains: If Zipcar couldn't make a profit before, when petrol prices were manageable, then they're going to be hard-pressed to turn a profit now, with no crude solution in sight. Zipcar says it needs about two years in a metro area to establish itself before it can turn a profit.

But the company has been in operation for more than four times that time span in the United States, and it hasn't figured out how to make a profit, yet. Nine years is a long time

Customers must return the car to the same parking spot at the end of the reserved time.

Zip car stresses its contribution to saving the environment. It says surveys of its customers indicate about a third would have kept their car or purchased one if they could not use Zipcar.

Robert Deyling, a tawyer who lives in Washington, D.C., says not having a car encourages him to walk and take buses more. He uses Zipcar about twice a month to go places he cannot reach by public transportation, like evening events at his daughter's grade school.

"Not having a car is definitely saving

to still be in growth mode. In May 2008, Zipcar's Chief Executive Officer Scott Griffith said it should be profitable by the end of this year or early 2009. As a private company, Zipcar doesn't release financial data....

The clear solution, of course, is to raise prices more than 3 percent to 5 percent. But that move may be even riskier than relying on new membership. Zipcar's niche industry is about to get more heavily trafficked, and competition usually drives prices down. U-Haul, Hertz and Enterprise, vehicle rental companies, are all dipping their toes in the car share pool. If Zipcar raises its prices, it could alienate its users

For more information: Zipcar http://www.zipcar.com/ Car sharing http://www.carsharing.neV me money," he says. "My costs for the occasional car rental, car-sharing and taxis probably wouldn't even be the cost of [petrol] if! owned a car." ~ Burton Bollag is a special correspondent for America.goD Please share your views on this article. Write to editorspan@state.gov

just as new outfits come in to challenge Zipcar's stronghold ....

For the traditional rental car companies, car sharing offers a lifeline from a crashing car-rental market. Between a decrease in travel, a poor U.S. auto outlook, and high petrol prices, car-rental stocks aren't in good shape. Car sharing offers a new revenue stream for the companies to explore, if to appease shareholders more than anything else. But these new entrants are going to be even worse at turning a profit than Zipcar. They have to go through the growing pains of learning a new industry that has subtle differences from their bread and butter. Plus, they can't compete too

heavily with Zipcar on pricing because of the thorn in everybody's side: petrol prices. Entering the fray is a fool's errand.

U-Haul knows this, but they're forging ahead anyway. Mike Coleman, the program manager for UHaul's U Car Share, told me that the company doesn't expect to earn a profit from car sharing for a long time. Eventually they'd like to be profitable, but for now they're in it to help grow the car-sharing industry and get cars off the road. As he was describing these lofty ideas to me, Coleman sounded like a program manager for an environmental nonprofit, not a private trucking company out to make a buck.

The irony, though, is that by trying to help the industry, U-Haul and the other new car-sharing entrants may end up suffocating it. As evidenced by Zipcar's profit struggles, car sharing is still too fragile to be ready for competition. Competition will prevent companies from raising the flat rates, which will stop them from recouping losses on higher petrol prices. Car sharing was originally an economic model ahead of its time. Now, though, its moment appears to have passed, without ever shifting into high gear.

4:i

Chadwick Matlin is a staff reporter for The Big Money, Slate's business site.

,

Exhibits of bad art, aliens, spy tools, even cockroaches, showcase humor and individuality. ay the word "museum" and most people envision an art gallery or an institution full of dinosaur bones, historic dioramas and cultural artifacts. However, America is also dotted with museums that pay tribute to the idiosyncrasies of a nation that prizes individuality, creativity and bold ideas.

Oddball museums are very much in the tradition of the roadside attractions that lend humor and character to towns all across the United States.

Here are a few suggestions for tourists who are willing to stray off the beaten path.

Billing itself as "a great monument to the work of unrecognized bad artists everywhere," the Museum of Bad Art in Dedham, Massachusetts, collects and displays examples of earnest artwork gone horribly wrong.

Located in the basement of an old building, "MOBA is appropriately lit by one large, humming, fluorescent light fixture," the museum's Web site proudly proclaims.

S

) oi;-

i'i

1 !l:=. tL

~ ~ ~ w ~

2 ~ ~

I

---------------------

!

Left: The cover of a book featuring 70 works from the permanent collection of the Museum of Bad Art.

~ :" "',

Above right: Visitors at the International UFO Museum and Research Center in Roswell, New Mexico, next to aflying saucer and alien exhibit during the 2006 UFO Festival.

Right: The Oscar Mayer Wienermobile, an automobile shaped like a hot dog, parked outside the SPAM Museum in Austin, Minnesota.

I '" @

z

~ ~ Z I

> z

w

53 0' I

o

for more information:

Right: Liberace, in one of his bejeweled costumes.

Almost as diverting as the artwork is the museum's description of each piece, in language that parodies the pretentious prose often found in art criticism (for example, a painting called "Peter the !(jtty" is said to be "stirring in its portrayal of feline angst").

St. Paul, Minnesota, is home to the Museum of Questionable Medical Devices.

Celebrated as the Quackery Hall of Fame, it has an impressive collection of phrenology machines (which claim to analyze character traits by reading the bumps on a person's

head) and hundreds of other contraptions, such as the Nose Straightener, the Battle Creek Vibratory Chair and the MacGregor Rejuvenator, a machine that attempts to reverse the aging process by blasting patients with magnetic waves.

The museum-which The New York Times calls "a stunning testament to the myriad of ways people have tried to make money off the eternal ills of humankind"-is nestled within its parent institution, the Science Museum of Minnesota.

The Vent Haven Museum in Fort Mitchell, Kentucky, houses more than 700 meticulously crafted ventriloquist dummies. Originally used in vaudeville stage acts, films and old television shows, the dummies can be manipulated to wink, roll their eyes, lift their eyebrows, wiggle their noses and ears, smile, cry, spit and salute. Among the many memorable characters inhabiting the museum are Champagne Charlie, a tuxedo-clad dummy that actually smokes a cigarette; a rustic matron called the

Farmer.s Wife (also known as Rachel, the Gossip Lady); Elmer Sneezeweed, a figure that appeared in cowboy movies from the 1930s to the 1950s; and Cleo, a glamor-girl dummy based on actress Marilyn Monroe.

The town of Austin, Minnesota, proudly bears the nickname "Spamtown U.S.A."-not because of any association with junk e-mail, but because Austin is the birthplace of the other type of SPAM: a canned meat product manufactured by the Hormel Foods Corporation. Invented in 1937, SPAM-a processed food made from pork-was fed to Allied troops during World War II, and Horme1 officials boasted that their product thus became "the savior of civilization." To honor SPAM's contribution to humanity, Hormel Foods built the SPAM Museum. The facility offers vast quantities of SPAM trivia, a world map indicating which countries consume the most SPAM and a television screen broadcasting the famous skit by the English comedy troupe Monty Python's Flying Circus (featuring Vikings singing a rousing chorus of "SPAM, SPAM, SPAM" that drowns out any Below: Michael Bohdan shows off a diorama of roaches relaxing at the beach at the Cockroach Hall of Fame in Plano, Texas.

Bohdan displays the exhibits inside his do-ityourself pest control shop.

Below right: Marilyn Monroach, one of the dressed up cockroaches at the Hall of Fame.

attempt at conversation).

All that glitters may not be gold, but there's no shortage of sparkle at the Liberace Museum in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Dedicated to the memory of the flamboyant entertainer and pianist who called himself "Mr. Showmanship," the museum displays Liberace's ornate stage costumes (festooned with sequins, rhinestones and ostrich feathers), his jewelry, lavishly appointed cars (including a Rolls Royce covered in mirrored tiles) and gem-studded pianos. The museum occasionally hosts tribute concerts by Liberace-inspired performers, a concession to fans who still pine for the original. Liberace rued in 1987.

Conspiracy theorists will want to investigate the International UFO Museum and Research Center in Roswell, New Mexico.

Believers in UFOs-unidentified flying objects-insist they have spotted them flying over Roswell with surprising regularity over the years. Roswell was also the site of a famous incident in 1947, when an object that appeared to be a flying saucer crashed to Earth. The local Air Force base, which was tasked with the cleanup of the crash site, maintained that it was a research balloon, but many UFO proponents believe that story is a cover-up. At the UFO Museum, each room has been designed to evoke the feeling of 1947, with a recreated newsroom, a supposed government "cover-up" room and information about alien sightings in general.

Those who harbor an inner James Bond should pay a visit-surreptitiously, of course-to the International Spy Museum in Washington, D.C. The museum traces the history of espionage through the stories of people who practiced the profession, and visitors are expected to adopt a cover identity, memorize specific details about it and learn firsthand the importance of keeping one's "cover." There is also a collection of authentic tools used by covert agents: the lipstick pistol, referred to as the "kiss of death" by Soviet operatives who used it in the rnid-1960s; the shoe with heel transmitter, produced by the Soviets during the Cold War to monitor secret conversations; and the tree-stump listening device created by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency in the early 1970s, a solar-powered mechanism disguised as a tree stump that was placed in the woods to capture secret radio transmissions.

Many other quirky museums await the adventurous tourist. From dog sleds to Barbie dolls to dead cockroaches dressed as celebrities and historical figures-as in the Cockroach Hall of Fame Museum in Plano, Texas-there is truly something for everyone. ~ Lauren writer.

Monsen

is an America.gov

staff

Please share your views on this article. Write to editorspan@state.gov

he lure of the open road is a favorite theme in U.S. popular culture.

Immortalized in literature, music and film, the so-called Great American Road Trip is a rite of passage for American youth seeking adventure and is also a popular vacation choice for families.

Traversing the United States by car is an invitation to supplement-or ditchthe standard tourist agenda and seek out some of the country's most treasured oddities: quirky local attractions that offer a glimpse at America's lighter side. These curiosities can be found in every state, and opinions vary as to which ones are worth a visit. In the interest of offering some guidance to novelty seekers, here is a brief survey of unconventional U.S. attractions.

T

Great balls 01twine No fewer than four contenders vie for the title of the world's largest ball of twine, an object that delights visitors with

its utter pointlessness.

The oldest contender-located in Darwin, Minnesota-is billed as the largest such object ever constructed by a single person. Francis A. Johnson began wrapping twine into a ball in the early 1950s and continued until his death in 1989. Measuring 12 meters in circumference and weighing 7,900 kilograms, Johnson's ball of twine has become a source of civic pride; townspeople celebrate Twine Ball Day every August.

Frank Stoeber, of Cawker City, Kansas, regarded Johnson's ball as a challenge and decided to start his own. He died in 1974 before surpassing Johnson's record, but every August, a Twine-a-thon is held where people add more twine to the ball.

Its supporters rank it as the world's largest and heaviest ball of sisal twine, weighing almost 8,165 kilograms and measuring 12 meters in circumference.

The third contender-in Lake Nebagamon, Wisconsin-is the project of James Frank Kotera, who started wrapping his twine ball in 1979. He continues to work on it, and by his estimation, the ball weighs 8,700 kilograms, which would make it the heaviest ball of twine ever. Kotera's ball sits in an open-air enclosure on its creator's front lawn; it has a smaller companion, Junior, made of yarn.

Not to be outdone, the town of Branson, Missouri, boasts its own ball of twine, allegedly certified by the Guinness Book ~ of World Records as the "world's largest," ~ although this distinction might be fleeting, ~ since the Kansas and Wisconsin balls are w

z---------------(!)

~ A visitor walks around one of the world's ~ largest balls of twine, weighing more than o 8,000 kilograms, in Cawker City, Kansas.

For more information: Twine Ball Museum still works in progress. Owned by the Ripley's Believe It or Not! Museum, the Missouri ball measures 12.6 meters in circumference.

Car culture Two of the best known auto-themed attractions in the United States are Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo, Texas, and Carhenge near Alliance, Nebraska.

Cadillac Ranch---conceived as a tribute to America's most famous luxury automobile-is a tongue-in-cheek aIt installation of vintage Cadillacs dating from 1949 to 1963, featuring cars lined up in a row with their front ends buried in the ground. The cars' back ends, with tail fins pointing at the sky, form a permanent salute to America's automotive heritage. Visitors are encouraged to

much-loved Fremont Troll lurks beneath the Aurora Bridge, gripping a real Volkswagen Beetle car in one enormous hand. In Klamath, California, the Trees of Mystery site contains a number of unusual tree formations, and its entrance is guarded by statues of the mythical lumberjack Paul Bunyan, who stands nearly 15 meters high, and Bunyan's sidekick, Babe the Blue Ox. Bunyan's mechanical right hand offers a sluggish wave and his

Left: Carhenge, a replica of England's Stonehenge, in Nebraska.

Right: The Fremont Troll in Seattle, Washington state.

bring cans of spray paint to decorate the "sculptures."

Cat'henge is a sly replica of England's Stonehenge (a prehistoric burial ground marked by a circular setting of large, vertical stones), but in place of the stones that define the English prototype, its modem-day twin is constructed of 38 .vintage American cars arranged in a circle ..<l1 The cars have been spray-painted a unifOlm gray, mimicking the color ~ of natural stone, and the entire ~ structure sits in the middle of a 8 grassy plain. With the addition of other automobile sculptures nearby, the site is now known as the Car Art Reserve.

I

Curious criners and more Popular landmarks across the United States often include giant statues representing real or imaginary figures. In Seattle, Washington state, the ugly but

Statues of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox at Klamath, California.

"voice" (courtesy of a loudspeaker in his breast pocket) cheerfully greets visitors and answers their questions.

Dinosaur theme parks can be found coast to coast, but Dinosaur Land in White Post, Virginia, is a particular favorite of

http://www.darwintwineball.com/twineball.html Carhenge http://www.carhenge.com/ Trees of Mystery http://www .treesofmystery. neV children. Huge fiberglass replicas of prehistoric beasts, some locked in mortal combat, populate the forested grounds. Not all the creatures are dinosaurs, however; a towering cobra, an outsized praying mantis, a shark and a model of King Kong are part of the mix. The park's loopy "dawn of time" effect is heightened by a caveman diorama, located indoors. A diorama is a scene replicated in three dimensions by placing objects in front of a painted background, as in the Gandhi Smriti in New Delhi.

An architectural folly known as the Haines Shoe House, located in Hellam, Pennsylvania, is a classic of roadside Americana. A 7.6-meter edifice that looks like a gigantic work boot, the house was built in

1948 as an advertising gimmick by Mahlon N. Haines, who owned shoe stores in Maryland and Pennsylvania. The three-bedroom Shoe House features stained-glass windows with a shoe motif. Haines initially used the house as guest quarters for the elderly couples and newlyweds whom he invited for weekend visits.

As part of this promotional stunt, he gave free pairs of shoes to his guests. Today, the Haines Shoe House is a museum; a shoe-shaped doghouse sits in the backyard.

Besides offering great photo opportunities, these roadside attractions serve as a reminder to plan for some wonderfully weird detours when embarking on a road trip in the United States. ~ Lauren Monsen is an America.gov staff writer.

Please share you r views on this article. Write to editorspan@state.gov

ohan, thought to be the world's oldest Indian rhino and the first to wear shoes, turned 39 in June. But as he kicks back and relaxes in a Florida old age home, his former caretakers, especially in Washington, D.C., can't help but reminisce about their time together, like former groupies in a rock star's shadow.

"He is one of the icons," says Ron Magill, the communications director for the Miami Metrozoo, who began caring for Mo, as his fans call him, in the early '80s.

"That's kind of the highlight of my career," Randy Pawlak, a farrier, or horse shoe maker, in Round Hill, Virginia, says about fashioning shoes for Mo in 2003. "It was probably the neatest thing I've ever done."

Mo was born in 1969 and captured out of the wild by a team that included Lowell Thomas, the world's fIrst roving newscaster, who fIlmed the 1919 documentary Lawrence in Arabia during World War I. The team gave Mohan to the [16-hectare] Crandon Park Zoo in Key Biscayne, Florida.

Ever since, he has been in the limelight. In

M

Mohan is the world's first rhino to wear shoes.

o With the World at His Feel

Formore inlormation: June he was in bookstores in The Rhino With Glue-On Shoes, in part an account of his struggle to stay on four feet after years of hard charging. Mohan is the title tale in the collection of stories from wild animal veterinarians, which was co-authored by former National Zoo director Lucy Spelman.

As a [680-kilogram] babe, he was mentioned in Time magazine's April 26, 1971, issue next to a blurb on "the latest Jackie book," which documented the former first lady's "passionate perfectionism."

"Mohan munched the greens," Time wrote, on the occasion of his captor, Thomas' 79th birthday, "and went right on munching until he was lunching on Thomas' trousers."

With wrinkled jowls, pimpled legs and platinum-blond ear hair, Mo has survived hurricanes and stagflation. Dry heat and Reaganomics. Along the way, he has moved from Crandon to its expanded iteration, the [300-hectare] Miami Metrozoo, and from there to Washington, D.C.'s National Zoo in 1998.

Mohan moved for the ladies, though he had issues with performance. He was genetically valuable, since his species was (and is) endangered in a region where people believe rhino horns possess medicinal value. Only [2,400] wild Indian rhinos remain.

So stud books-the technical termwere kept all over the United States, tracing Mo's pedigree as well as those of potential mates. When experts with the American Zoological Society decided to make a match, well, Mo picked on up and rumbled down the highway.

Yet, Mo wouldn't take to his female friends-and people started to whisper.

First, it was Shanti he turned down. Then Mechi. The star clearly wanted something else. Magill recalls Mohan would get excited every time he ate, but had less appetite for mating.

Air Mohan, the custommade, baske tballsized galosh worn by Mohan.

Luey Spelman's blog http://www. drl ueyspe Iman, eom/dr-I uey/2008/ jun/25/patient-update-1-mohan-rhino Great Asian one-horned rhino http://wwwwwlindia.org/one_horned_rhino.elm

the

rhino with

glue-on shoes i ~ ~ ~ o ~

j

and other surprising true stories of zoo vets and their patients' Edited

~ ~ ~ u

Lucy H. Spelman, DVM Ted Y. Mashima, DVM

by

."d

Foreword

~

by

Jack

Hanna

Another problem: Mo's feet started giving out. Somehow, this only made him a bigger celebrity. In June of '91, he had an abscess toward the bottom of one foot.

Magill couldn't get bandages to stick.

He figured only a boot would do the job. And "who makes stronger rubber than Pirelli?" So Magill phoned the tire company and asked them for a "one-of-akind piece." Noting the success of the Reebok Pump (the hoops shoe that inflates to fit your foot), Pirelli modeled a basketball-size galosh with a built-in air bladder. The label on the front: "Air Mohan." Mo wore it for several weeks until he healed, becoming the first sneaker-wearing rhino in the world. Then Mo left him, moving to Washington, and the legend grew. His keepers at the zoo called him "Psycho Mo" because of his moody, lead-singer tendencies. He'd let you scratch him one minute and then charge you the next. Like all captive rhinos, he had a thing for self-mutilation, grinding his keratin horn against hard surfaces until it was a six-inch nub. He was a bad boy. Then-zoo director Lucy Spelman fell for him.

"Mo's case was difficult, and we'd wracked our brains," e-mails Spelman-

who resigned from the zoo in 2004 as the National Academy of Sciences released a report critical of mistakes that led to zoo animal deaths-from Rwanda, where she now works for an organization that cares for mountain gorillas. Mo's feet had become a swollen, rotten muck, "an exuberant growth of granulation tissue," according to his keepers' tell-all slide show "Chronic Foot Disease-One Rhino's Story."

The rehab? Caretakers sedated Mo regularly to carve dead tissue from the three hoofed toes of each foot. They'd cut until blood streamed from his soles.

But it resolved only the symptoms.

According to her book, it wasn't until Spelman attended a talk on rhino feet that she realized the underlying cause: Except for summer, Mo was mostly kept on a concrete floor, a surface much harder than his natural habitat, a muddy swamp that allows a rhino to balance on its hoofed toes, relieving its soles from bearing weight. The zoo's concrete floors shaved those hooves down, forcing Mohan to land on his footpad.

Thus was born the second iteration of Mo's footwear-not boots this time, but flats-cut up horseshoes, one for each rhino toe on the front, adhered with epoxy and covered with Kevlar [a lightweight, yet extremely strong fiber].

And the National Zoo celebrated what it thought unprecedented: a rhino strutting in its own shoes. "Bet this is a first," Spelman says in her book, not realizing how much bigger Mohan was, how he had other firsts before hers.

Mo is back in Miami now, having left Washington, D.C., in June 2003, to breed (unsuccessfully). He lives a quiet life, in a non-exhibited part of the zoo-"a nice retirement area where he doesn't get disturbed by anybody," Magill says, "kinda like the Club Med for rhinos." The surface is soft dirt and sand, his hooves have regrown and he doesn't need footwear.

In July [2007], Mo scratched his shoulder, and he was lethargic in September, and in November he passed a soft stool.

But for an otherwise healthy rhino, such symptoms are normal.

Even a rock star has to slow down.~ Gabe Oppenheim writer.

is a Washington Post staff

s a naval aviator, prisoner of war in Vietnam, Congressman and Senator, John McCain's life story has been distinguished by such consistent core traits as a willingness to speak his mind, an adherence to deeply held values and principles, a devotion to duty, and a fiercely guarded streak of independence. Those characteristics, which earned him the anger of his North Vietnamese captors, and sometimes even the occasional rancor of his Republican colleagues, have also won McCain the support and admiration of millions of American voters.

As the man whom the Almanac of American Politics calls "the closest thing our politics has to a national hero"-the Silver Star, Distinguished Flying Cross, and Purple Heart are among his medals-McCain burnished his already high profile with an inde- ~ pendent-minded campaign for the 2000 Republican presidential :;'( nomination which captured the imagination of many Americans. Š He emerged from that losing effort as one of the most respected voices in the U.S. Senate, especially on national security issues, and one of the most prominent figures in the Republican Party.

Perhaps more than any other quality, the concept of personal honor has been consistently central to McCain's public persona.

"In prison, where my cherished independence was mocked and assaulted, I found my self-respect in a shared fidelity to my country," McCain wrote in his autobiography Faith of My Fathers. "All honor comes with obligations. I and the men with whom I served had accepted ours, and we were grateful for the privilege."

A

The early years The son and grandson of U.S. Navy admirals, John Sidney McCain was born August 29, 1936, in the U.S.-administered Panama Canal Zone territory. The military legacy of his family, which traces its roots to the Highlands of Scotland, actually extends as far back as America's 18th century War of Independence, when one of McCain's ancestors served on General George Washington's staff.

ll-

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Far left: McCain at a town hall meeting in Aurora, Colorado.

Left: McCain arrives home in 1973 from Vietnam, where he was a prisoner of war for more than five years. He was met by his first wife, Carol, and son Doug, on crutches after breaking his leg in a soccer game.

Left: McCain, with son Jack, in a cell at the Hoa La Prison in North Vietnam, during a 2000 trip.

John McCain and wife, Cindy, at the end of a town hall meeting in Peterborough, New Hampshire.

In typical military fashion, the young McCain led a nomadic existence as his father's assignments forced the family to move frequently from one naval base to the next. This constant uprooting may have played a role in shaping McCain's temperament as an outsider and an independent. As he put it, "At each new school I arri ved eager to make, by means of my insolent attitude, new friends to compensate for the loss of others .... At each new school I became a more unrepentant pain in the neck."

In 1954, McCain graduated from Episcopal High School in Alexandria, Virginia, and kept his "unavoidable appointment" with the U.S. Naval Academy. At the academy, he embarked upon a self-described "four-year course of insubordination and rebellion." Earning a reputation as an affable fellow always ready for a party, racking up numerous demerits for his behavior, and often struggling academically, McCain persevered and graduated in 1958, ranking fifth from the bottom of his class.

Naval aviator and prisoner of war Commissioned as a naval officer, McCain attended flight school in Pensacola, Florida, where he earned his pilot's wings.

In the early 1960s, he embarked on several aircraft carrier deployments to the Mediterranean. As American involvement in the Vietnam War deepened in the mid-1960s, however, McCain

began to aspire to positions of command and determined that a credible combat record was the best way to achieve it.

Serving on the USS Forrestal in the Tonkin Gulf off the North Vietnamese coast in 1967, McCain barely escaped with his life when a horrific fire swept the flight deck and engulfed his A-4 attack jet as he waited to launch. Soon thereafter, McCain voluntarily transferred off the crippled ship to another squadron aboard the carrier USS Oriskany.

John McCain greets war veterans during a campaign stop at the Maine Military Museum in South Portland.

McCain's life changed forever on October 26, 1967. While on a bombing raid against an electrical power plant in Hanoi, a surface-to-air missile tore the right wing off his A-4. Ejecting from his doomed aircraft, McCain parachuted into a lake in the center of the city, suffering two broken arms and a broken knee.

Captured immediately, he began five and a half years of imprisonment, marked by often brutal mistreatment and torture, in a series of North Vietnamese prisoner of \ war (POW) camps.

Like other American POWs, McCain was the frequent target of savage beatings and interrogations conducted by his captors to elicit military information or antiU.S. propaganda statements. After refusing an offer of early release, McCain was beaten so severely for several days that he eventually signed a forced confession, an event that caused him anguished despair and shame. Yet, he rebounded from this personal nadir to earn a well-deserved reputation as a tough resister, the ultimate ~ compliment his fellow POWs bestowed ~ upon the toughest among them. ~ o McCain attributed his endurance of cap- ~ tivity, including two years of solitary con- ffi finement, to faith-"faith in God, faith in ~ country, faith in your fellow prisoners."

Speaking of his fellow POWs' resistance and bravery, McCain said, "They were a lantern for me, a lantern of courage and faith that illuminated the way home with honor, and I struggled against panic and despair to stay in its light."

Entrv into politics After the signing of the peace accord between the United States and North Vietnam in January 1973 that included the release of all POWs, McCain regained his freedom on March 15 of that year. Despite the severity of his wartime injuriesMcCain can be seen in news footage limping off the plane that carried him to freedom-he worked intensely to rehabilitate himself physically to the point that he regained his flight status as a naval aviator.

From 1973 to 1974 he attended the National War College in Washington, D.C., writing a thesis that examined POW resistance in captivity, but it was a subsequent assignment that eventually charted a new direction in McCain's life. In 1977, McCain began to work as a Navy liaison officer to the U.S. Senate. In this role, the New York Times noted, he "relished the push and pull of legislative battles (and) ... built personal friendships and professional collaborations across ideological divides, a hallmark of his later Senate career."

Retiring from the Navy in 1981 after foregoing the offer of promotion to admiral, McCain moved to Arizona, the home state of his second wife, Cindy, whom he had married in 1980. In 1982, he

Above: John McCain walks with Renee Gould and her daughter Morgan through the fruit and vegetables section of King's Supermarket in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.

Left: McCain on a tour of a New Orleans area damaged by Hurricane Katrina.

made his fIrst run for political office and was elected to a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from Arizona's First Congressional District with 66 percent of the vote. Re-elected to the House in 1984, McCain subsequently ran for and won in 1986 the Senate seat vacated by the retiring incumbent Barry Goldwater (himself the 1964 Republican presidential nominee).

In the early years of his Senate career, McCain focused on issues close to his personal experience, such as national defense, support for military veterans, and normalizing relations with Vietnam, working on this last issue with Democratic Senator John Kerry, a fellow Vietnam War hero. Years later, when Kerry was the 2004 Democratic presidential candidate and under political attack, accused of misrepresenting his military service, McCain rose to the defense of his fellow veteran's war record.

Reaching across the political aisle is not uncommon for McCain. He has attempted to forge consensus with his Democratic colleagues in the Senate on solutions for complex, controversial issues-sometimes successfully, as in the case of normalized relations with Vietnam, sometimes unsuccessfully, as in his and Senator Edward Kennedy's attempt to tackle the highly charged question of illegal immigration.

Now in his fourth term as Senator, McCain has amassed a congressional voting record in line with most mainstream Republican political beliefs-a strong national defense, low taxes, opposition to activist judges, and a pro-life position on the abortion issue. Yet, he has also played the role of maverick as an

advocate of campaign finance reform and as a strong opponent of wasteful government spending and the practice of "earmarking," or specifying funding for legislators' pet projects.

nation contest of the Iowa caucus, McCain gambled and focused his efforts on the January 8 primary in New Hampshire, site of his great success in 2000. Spending months in that state and holding 101 town hall meetings with New Hampshire's famously independent voters, he was rewarded with a key victory over his major Republican rivals. Although victories in other early voting states were split among McCain, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, McCain solidified his front-runner position in the February 5 Super Tuesday primary election held simultaneously in more than 20 states. McCain won in such populous states as California, Illinois and New York, amassing a lead in delegates that none of his rivals could catch. On March 4, 2008, victories in Ohio and Texas allowed McCain to cross the threshold of 1,191 delegates needed to secure the Republican presidential nomination.

Running for president McCain's first foray into presidential politics came in 2000, when he ran for the Republican presidential nomination. Many voters found his candor, self-deprecating humor, and straightforward style attractive qualities that gained him not just national attention but also support transcending traditional party lines; his campaign bus was called The Straight Talk Express. McCain went on to score an impressive upset victory against putative front-runner George W. Bush in the always important, first-inthe-nation primary of New Hampshire. However, his campaign had mixed results thereafter as he failed to attract sufficient numbers of core Republican voters in other states. After losses in such major states as California and New York, McCain suspended his campaign and eventually threw his support to Bush, who returned the White House to Republican hands that November with his election as president.

Over the next several years McCain's profile in national politics remained high. The U.S. Congress finally enacted into law in 2002 the landmark legislation on campaign finance reform coauthored by McCain and Democratic Senator Russ Feingold. An advocate for a strong national defense policy, McCain supported the decision to invade Iraq in 2003, although he later turned sharply critical of the way the war was conducted in its early stages.

Re-elected to the Senate for a fourth term in 2004 by a 77 to 21 percent margin, McCain initially was viewed as one of the strongest contenders, if not the front-runner, for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination. Yet, as a large field of Republican candidates entered the race and began to organize in 2007 for the following year's marathon of primaries and caucuses, the McCain campaign began to implode, with staff shakeups, serious financial problems and fading polling results.

McCain's tenacity-the very quality that had gotten him through his POW years-again proved the indispensable factor in getting him through this rough period. "I have a very complicated strategy for you," one of his advisers told him. "Stay in the race until you're the last man standing."

That is precisely what McCain did. Skipping the first-in-the-

A McCain presidency;' The question of McCain's age has arisen during the campaign; if elected, McCain would take the oath of office at 72, the oldest first-term president. He has attempted to defuse concerns about

"~ ~

i

~ ~ ~ ~ E

"-

Left and far right: Cover artwork of a pair of comic book biographies of John McCain and Barack Obama, titled Presidential

Material.

From far left: John McCain with the Dalai Lama in Aspen, Colorado; Senator Hillary Clinton and McCain with Afghan President Hamid Karzai during a Congressional trip to Kabul; McCain at the Shorja market in central Baghdad, Iraq; McCain addresses the crowd during the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in South Dakota.

power and more offshore oil drilling, while his economic policy favors making permanent the large tax cuts enacted during the Bush presidency.

On other issues, however, McCain has promised an approach different from that of the current administration. He has emphasized, for example, a more collaborative approach with U.S. allies on foreign policy questions. He also has pledged a more activist response to global warming and climate change, including a 60 percent cut in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

Whatever the outcome of the 2008 election, John McCain undoubtedly will continue to serve the country to which he has devoted a lifetime. The reason is found in a simple yet eloquent passage from his autobiography in which he reflects upon a lesson learned while in captivity in North Vietnam.

"It wasn't until I had lost America for a time," he wrote, "that

his age and fitness for the job with an active campaign schedule and with his trademark humor directed at himself-cracking that he is "as old as dirt" and has "more scars than Frankenstein."

McCain perhaps also sends a subtle message that his health and energy level are up to the demands of the presidency by sometimes bringing along his robust, 96-year-old mother, Roberta, to campaign rallies.

McCain's campaign platform reflects his support of many traditional Republican policies, but also a willingness to chart a new course where he believes it necessary. An early and outspo- _I_re_a_l_iz_e_d_h_o_w_m_u_ch_I_I_o_ve_d_h_er_._" ~ ken advocate of the 2007 U.S. troop surge in Iraq, he has argued Domenick DiPasquale worked 27 years with the U.S. Information for maintaining a U.S. military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan Agency and the Department of State, and is now a freelance writer. until those nations achieve stability, as well as for continuing an aggressive fight against international terrorism, all tenets of current U.S. policy. His energy plan calls for greater use of nuclear

W

ill it be A~BA playing in the Oval Office next year or Jay-Z? Will children's movies be standard fare in the White House screening room after inauguration day in January, or another Harrison Ford adventure flick where the old guy is the hero?

Both Barack Obama and John McCain want to be America's favorite choice for president But which movie president do the candidates like best? What kind of music and TV shows do they favor?

Someone had to ask the tough questions, so Entertainment Weekly stepped up The magazine's interviews are posted at http://www.ew.com McCain

Obama

Favorite singer(s)

ABBA

Jay-Z

Favorite movie or TV president

Dennis Haysbert 24 (TV show)

Favorite movie

Viva Zapata

The Godfather

Which superhero would you be?

Batman

Spider-Man/Batman

First movie you remember seeing

Bambi

Born Free

Did you cry?

Oh, yeah

May have teared up

: Jeff Bridges The Contender (movie)

Barack Obama's unique biography and successful campaign for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination have opened a new chapter in U.S. politics.

arack Obama, the first African American presidential candidate to win the nomination of a major U.S. political party, brings a life story unlike that of any previous nominee.

The biracial son of a Kenyan father and a white mother from the American heartland, Obama shot to national prominence with his electrifying keynote speech at the Democratic national convention in 2004, the same year he was elected to the U.S. Senate from the state of Illinois. Just four years later, he rose to the top of a field crowded with Democratic heavyweights to clinch his party's nomination for the White House.

With a polished speaking style, a command of eloquent and uplifting rhetoric, the ability to inspire the enthusiasm of young voters, and the sophisticated use of the Internet as a campaign tool, Obama is very much a 21st century candidate. Yet, he has demonstrated the timeless skills common to all campaigns, including the ability to

B

Above: Barack Obama waves to the audience after his speech at the Victory Column monument in Berlin, Germany.

effectively wage old-fashioned political trench walfare as he ground through a long and sometimes divisive five-month primary season to defeat his chief rival, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.

In his campaign, Obama stressed two overarching themes: changing Washington's traditional way of conducting the nation's business and invoking Americans of diverse ideological, social and racial backgrounds to unite for the common good.

"There's not a liberal America and a conservative America-there's the United States of America," Obama said in his address to the 2004 Democratic national convention. "There's not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there's the United States of America .... We are one people,

all of us pledging allegiance to the Stars and Stripes, all of us defending â&#x20AC;˘. the United States of America."

from ghetto dwellers struggling with a host of devastating social ills.

The Illinois vears The earlY vears Obama's parents came from vastly different backgrounds. His mother, Ann Dunham, was born and raised in small-town Kansas. After her family moved to the Hawaiian Islands, she met Barack Obama Sr., a Kenyan scholarship student emolled at the University of Hawaii. The two manied in 1959, and on August 4, 1961, Barack Obama Jr. was born in Honolulu. Two years later the senior Obama left his new family, first for graduate study at Harvard and then for a job as a government economist back in Kenya. The young Obama met his father again only once, at 10.

When Obama was 6, his mother remanied, to an Indonesian oil executive. The family moved to Indonesia, and Obama spent four years attending school in Jakarta. He eventually returned to Hawaii and went to high school there while living with his maternal grandparents.

In ills first book, Dreams from My Father, Obama describes this period of his life as having more than the usual share of adolescent turmoil, as he struggled to make sense of a biracial heritage then still relatively uncommon in the United States. Being rooted in both black America and white America may have helped give Obama the expansive vision he brought to politics years later, one that understands both points of view.

"Barack has an incredible ability to synthesize seemingly contradictory realities and make them coherent," his law school classmate Cassandra Butts told New Yorker magazine. "It comes from going from a home where willte people are nurtUling you, and then you go out into the world and you're seen as a black person."

Obama left Hawaii once more to attend Occidental College in Los Angeles, California, for two years. He later moved to New York City and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Columbia University in 1983. His relatively short stay in New York shaped a desire to work at the grass roots level, as Obama saw first-hand the chasm separating the city's wealthy elite

In search of ills identity and a purposeful direction in life, Obama subsequently left ills job as a financial writer with an international consulting firm in New York and headed to Cillcago, lllinois, in 1985. There, he worked as a community organizer for a coalition of local churches on the city's South Side, a poor African American area hard hit by the transition from a manufacturing center to a service-based economy.

"It was in these neighborhoods that I recei ved the best education I ever had, and where I learned the true meaning of my Christian faith," Obama recounted years later in the speech announcing his presidential candidacy.

Obama enjoyed some tangible successes in this work, giving South Side residents a voice in such issues as economic redevelopment, job training and environmental clean-up efforts. He viewed his primary role as a community organizer, however, as that of a catalyst mobilizing ordinary citizens in a bottom-up effOlt to forge indigenous strategies for political and economic empowerment.

After three years, Obama concluded that to bring about true improvement in such distressed communities required involvement at a higher level, in the realm of law and politics. Accordingly, he attended Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he distinguished illmself by being elected the first black president of the prestigious Harvard Law Review and graduating magna cum Laude (with great honor) in 1991.

With such impeccable credentials, "Obama could have done anything he wanted," says David Axelrod, now ills presidential campaign strategist. Obanla returned to his adopted hometown of Chicago, where he practiced civil rights law and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago. In 1992 he mamed Michelle Robinson, another Harvard Law graduate, and worked on voter registration in Cillcago to help Democratic candidates such as Bill Clinton.

With a continuing strong commitment to public service, Obama decided to make his first run at elective office in 1996, winning a seat from Chicago in the lllinois

D-

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ :1i

Top: Michelle and Barnck Obama dance as Oprah Winfrey (right) looks on at the Williams Brice Stadium in Columbia, South Carolina.

Above: Obama teaching at the University of Chicago Law School.

state senate. In many ways the race was a logical progression of his earlier work as a community organizer, and Obama brought much of that same expansive outlook-the politician as an enabler of citizen-directed grass roots efforts and a builder of broadbased coalitions-to ills vision of politics.

"Any African Americans who are only talking about racism as a bamer to our success are seriously misled if they don't also come to grips with the larger economic forces that are creating economic insecurity for all workers-willtes, Latinos and Asians," he said at the time. Among his legislative accomplishments by the end of eight years in the state senate were campaign finance reform, tax cuts for the working poor, and improvements to the state's criminal justice system.

The national stage In 2000, Obama made his first run for the U.S. Congress, unsuccessfully

challenging Bobby Rush, an incumbent Democrat from Chicago, for Rush's seat in the House of Representatives. Dispirited by his lopsided primary loss to Rush and searching for influence beyond the Illinois state legislature, he sold Michelle on the idea of his running for the U.S. Senate in a last-shot "up or out strategy" to advance his political career.

The 2004 U.S. Senate race in Illinois had turned into a free-for-all the year before, when the Republican incumbent, Peter Fitzgerald, announced he would not seek re-election. Seven Democrats and eight Republicans contested their respective party's primary for the senatorial nomination. Obama easily captured the Democratic nomination, winning a greater share of the vote-53 percent-than his

six opponents combined.

With the Republicans then holding the lOO-member U.S. Senate by a razor-thin majority of 51 seats, Democrats saw the senatorial contest in Illinois as critical to their chances of retaking the Senate that November (in fact, they only regained control in 2006). The desire to give Obama's campaign a boost through a prominent convention role, the well-known oratory skills Obama possessed, and the very favorable impression he already had made on Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, clinched the decision to select Obama as the convention's keynote speaker.

Obama's speech, with its soaring, polished language on the need to transcend partisan divisions and its call for a "politics of hope" rather than a politics of cynicism,

did more than rouse convention-goers; it catapulted Obama into the national media spotlight as a lising star of the Democratic Patty. He went on to win handily in the Senate race that autumn, capturing an overwhelming 70 percent of the popular vote.

Although the near-total disarray that year among Republicans in Illinois undoubtedly contributed to the landslide margin, Obama's victory was impressive in its own Above: Bamek Obama, holding daughter Malia, and wife Michelle, holding daughter Sasha, after winning the U.S. Senate race in 2004.

Below left: Obama with grandparents, Madelyn Payne and Stanley Armour Dunham, at his high school graduation in Hawaii.

Below: Obama and Sasha ride bumper cars at the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines.

Right: Barack Obama with Anbar province Governor Maamoun Sami Rashid al-Alwani (right), in Ramadi, Iraq.

Right center: Obama and top U.S. military commander in Iraq, David Petraeus, take a helicopter ride over Baghdad.

Right bottom: Obama at the Victory Column in Berlin, Germany.

right, as he won in 92 of the state's 102 counties and captured white voters by a better than two-to-one margin.

Obama's reputation as a new breed of politician, one able to overcome traditional racial divides, grew steadily. In a New Yorker profile of Obama, writer William Finnegan, noting Obama's talent at "slipping subtly into the idiom of his interlocutor," said Obama "speaks a full range of American vernaculars." Obama offered his own explanation why he could connect with white voters.

"I know these people," he said. "Those are my grandparents .... Their manners, their sensibilities, their sense of right and wrong-it's all totally familiar to me."

In the Senate, Obama amassed a voting record in line with that of the Democratic Party's liberal wing. His criticism of the war in Iraq has been one of his trademarks, dating back to a speech in 2002, even before the war started, when he warned that any such military action would be based "not on principle but on politics."

He has also worked to strengthen ethical standards in Congress, improve care for military veterans and increase use of renewable fuels.

"~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ill

0: 9

Running for president

0

As Obama and seven other contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination began to organize in 2007, opinion polls consistently put Obama in second place behind the presumed favorite, New York Senator Hillary Clinton. Obama, however, was highly successful in this early stage of the race at enlisting an enthusiastic cadre of supporters, especially among youth, establishing a nationwide grass-roots campaign organization, and fundraising through the Internet.

With Clinton enjoying greater name recognition, a well-oiled campaign machine, and support at the state level from leading Democrats, the Obama camp devised an innovative strategy to negate these advantages: targeting states

~

"-. ~ ~ ~~

5 ~

that used caucuses rather than ptimaries to select delegates, and focusing on smaller states that traditionally voted Republican in the general election. This approach capitalized on the Democratic Patty's system of propOltional representation-awarding convention delegates in each state in rough proportion to a candidate's share of the vote-as opposed to the Republicans' system of awarding most or all convention delegates to the winner in each state.

The strategy paid off with the ftrst-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses on January 3, 2008, when Obama scored an upset victory over Clinton.

The Iowa win was a game-changer; as The Washington Post put it,/ "Beating Clinton ... altered the I~\ course of the race by establishing 1\\ Obama as her chief rival-the only ~ candidate with the message, orga- ~ @ nizational muscle and financial di resources to challenge her front- ffi runner status." ~ z It paid off once more on Super ~ Tuesday-the elections held simul- ~ taneously in 22 states on February 5-when Obama dueled Clinton to a tie and swept rural states in the West and South. And it paid off yet again when Obama went on to win 10 more consecutive contests in February, cementing a lead in delegates Clinton never again could catch.

Despite a difficult March and Aprillosses in the major states of Ohio and Pennsylvania; inflammatory remarks by Obama's long-time pastor; and harsh criticism of Obama's comments about how rural voters "cling" to guns and religion out of bitterness-Obama's delegate lead inexorably grew to the point where it became almost statistically impossible for Clinton to win. Finally, on June 3, exactly five months after the contest began, the exhausting race was over. The combination of a victory in Montana and growing support from previously uncommitted superdelegates gave Obama the majority of delegates needed to clinch the presidential nomination.

"Because you chose not to listen to your doubts or your fears but to your . greatest hopes and highest aspirations," Obama told supporters that evening at a victory rally in St. Paul, Minnesota,

Barack Obama reads through the keynote address he delivered at the 2004 Democratic nationaL convention in Chicago. "tonight we mark the end of one historic journey with the beginning of another."

An Obama presidencv:禄 If elected, Obama would be the fifthyoungest U.S. president. Born at the tail end of the 1946-1964 Baby Boom generation, he also would be the ftrst president to have come of age in the 1980s, which of itself might portend change. The atmosphere in which he grew up was markedly different from the socially tumultuous 1960s that shaped earlier Baby Boomers' outlook. As Obama once said about the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections, contested by candidates from a much earlier cohort of that post-war generation, "I sometimes felt as if I were watching the psychodrama of the Baby Boom generation-a tale rooted in old grudges and revenge plots hatched on a handful of college campuses long agoplayed out on the national stage."

Obama's "Change We Can Believe In" slogan reflects his campaign's emphasis on taking the United States in a new direc-

tion. Obama has advocated a steady timetable for withdrawing U.S. combat troops from Iraq, although he would leave some for training and anti-terrorism missions. Other positions include increasing military and development assistance to Afghanistan, closing the Guantanamo Bay prison for terrorism detainees, and strengthening nucleat路 non-proliferation efforts. Domestically, Obama wants to invest $150 billion over 10 years to spur development of clean energy technology, increase investment in education and infrastructure to make the U.S. economy more globally competitive, and restore fiscal discipline to government spending.

The New Yorker's Larissa MacFarquhar offered one theory on Obama's noticeable appeal across traditional political lines. "Obama's voting record is one of the most liberal in the Senate," she observed, "but he has always appealed to Republicans, perhaps because he speaks about liberal goals in conservative language.

"In his view of history, in his respect for tradition, in his skepticism that the world can be changed any way but very, very slowly," she wrote, "Obama is deeply conservati ve."

Win or lose in November, Obama has broken new ground in U.S. politics. His candidacy came at precisely the time when many Americans believed their country needed a fundamental transformation in its direction. Washington Post political columnist E.J. Dionne may have summed up perfectly the serendipitous confluence between Obama's candidacy and the American zeitgeist when he wrote: "Change, not experience, was the order of the day. Sweep, not a mastery of detail, was the virtue most valued in campaign oratory. A clean break with the past, not merely a return to better days, was the promise most prized." ~ Domenick DiPasquaLe worked 27 years with the U.S. Information Agency and the Department of State, and is now a freelance writer .

Please share your views on this article. Write editorspan@state.gov

to

What Makes a GoodVice

President

Geography, experience, gender, politics and personality are considered when U.S. presidential nominees choose their running mates.

uring the 2008 primaries and caucuses, record numbers of Amelicans cast ballots for the presidential nominees. But only one person's vote mattered when vice presidential candidates were being considered.

U.S. vice presidential candidates are selected by the presidential nominees of the political parties. The nominee might get help from others, but ultimately he makes a political and personal decision.

Often, the choice and the reasons for it give voters their first concrete insight into the way the candidate thinks in making important decisions, and this may factor

D

Joe Biden

into the decision on whom to elect.

"This gives us a bit of a window [on the presidential candidates'] thinking and the types of judgments they have about people," says Leonard Steinhorn, professor of communication at American University in Washington, D.C. Is the choice a big surprise, risky or predictable? Did the candidate take others into confidence or go it alone? Do voters react: "Why did he pick that guy?" or "Wow, what an innovative choice!"

The factors in selecting a running mate include how a candidate can help the campaign and how he or she would handle running the country if the president could not.

The main constitutional purpose of a vice president is to temporarily or permanently take on the duties, or the office, of the presidency should the president become incapacitated mentally or physically, or die in office, resign or be ousted by impeachment.

In U.S. history, nine vice presidents have ascended to the presidency during their term, while others have taken on presidential duties temporarily. For example, Vice President Dick Cheney assumed presidential powers in 2002 and 2007 when President George W. Bush was under anesthesia for a medical procedure. While Stein horn is among experts who feel the vice presidential choice does not matter

Democratic Vice Presidential Candidate

U.S. Senator Joe Biden, 65, has represented the small east coast state of Delaware since 1972, when he was elected to the US Senate at the age of 29.

Best known for his international relations and national security experience, Biden chairs the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, which has a powerful role in shaping US. foreign policy. He has traveled to many countries, most recently to Georgia. He was in India in February. Biden sought the presidency in 1988 and again in 2008, but withdrew from the race after the Iowa caucuses. In a presidential campaign first, thousands of supporters learned of Barack Obama's selection of Biden via text message.

Sarah Palin Republican

Vice Presidential Candidate

Sarah Palin, 44, is the governor of Alaska and the first woman to run on a Republican presidential ticket. She was elected governor in 2006, defeating the incumbent governor in a Republican primary, and became the youngest and the first female leader of Alaska. Prior to serving as governor, Palin was the mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, for six years and chairwoman of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. As governor, Palin created Alaska's Petroleum Systems Integrity Office to provide oversight and maintenance of oil and gas equipment, facilities and infrastructure, and the Climate Change Subcabinet to prepare a climate change strategy for Alaska. She also helped revise Alaska's ethics laws.

The Electoral College

is the group that actually elects the president and vice president. The Electors are chosen on a state-by-state basis, according to how many US Congress members the states have. More populous states have more members. If a presidential candidate wins most of the ballots cast in a state, he gets all of the Electoral votes from that state.

This is why a candidate can win more popular votes across the United States, but can lose the election to an opponent who does better in more populous states.

that much when voters are marking their ballots, others feel that the electorate must be able to visualize the vice presidential candidate as being capable of carrying out presidential responsibilities should the need arise. Otherwise, they may be nervous about voting for that team, or "ticket."

Often candidates consider how a vice presidential nominee from a region or background different from that of the presidential nominee could attract voters by "balancing the ticket." Running mates with political viewpoints that differ somewhat from the presidential nominee can balance a ticket as well. A vice presidential candidate who is popular in his home state can help the ticket win if his state is populous and has a lot of Electoral College votes.

In 2004, John Kerry, a New Englander from Massachusetts, and John Edwards,

from the southern state of North Carolina, ran as the Democratic presidential and vice presidential nominees. Edwards had sought the presidency, and Kerry's campaign hoped adding Edwards to the ticket would bring in Edwards' supporters.

"But there are always exceptions to the rule," Steinhorn says. In 1992, Democrat Bill Clinton of Arkansas selected Al Gore, a senator from Tennessee, who was "another southern moderate."

Sometimes party leaders pressure the presumed presidential nominee to pick a running mate who they feel can offset a nominee's weaknesses. For example, a presidential candidate with little foreign policy expertise might be encouraged to select a running mate who has done extensive work overseas.

Despite these pressures, "a lot really depends on the individual candidates, and who they want as one of their top persons in their administrations," Stein horn says.

But the Constitution does not actually provide a role for the vice president in the administration, and some presidents have simply ignored their teammates after the election. Aside from being ready to ascend to the presidency, the vice president's other constitutional duty is to preside over the Senate, the upper house of the U.S. Congress, and cast a vote in case of a tie.

As the candidate ponders his options, he will get help from a team that develops a list of candidates, conducts preliminary interviews and completes exhaustive background checks to identify weaknesses that

could hurt the campaign.

Such a team might make surprising recommendations; alternatively, a candidate can choose someone the team did not consider. In 2000, Bush surprised many when he selected Dick Cheney, the head of his vice presidential search team, to be his running mate.

The vice presidential candidate's role on the campaign trail varies, but there is often a "good cop, bad cop" routine the running mates play, Stein horn says. The vice presidential candidate can attack the opponent while the presidential nominee remains above the fray. "If you want to act presidentiaL.you don't want to sound negative," he says. When Ronald Reagan was running for president, his vice presidential teammate, George H.W. Bush, was tough on the Democratic vice presidential nominee, Geraldine Ferraro, questioning her experience, ability and positions, while Reagan maintained the gentlemanly stance of not attacking a woman.

In the months between the primaries and the national conventions, U.S. news media were filled with speculation over who the presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama would pick to be their running mates. For the first time, an Indian American, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, was among those mentioned as a possible candidate for vice president of the United States.

The process of selecting vice presidential candidates has evolved over the last 232 years; America's earliest running mates were often competitors rather than partners.

Imagine what would happen if, in November, Americans selected a Democratic president and a Republican vice president. With top executives from two different parties, it could be difficult for the White House to present a unified message and political battles could slow progress. The founders of the American Republic leamed tms after watcmng the process unfold. Now a vice president of a different pa.J.tycan be elected only if the winning presidential candidate specifically selects mm or her as a running mate.

Originally, the candidate who finished second in Electoral College votes was U.S. President George W. Bush (left) and Vice President Dick Cheney at an event in Washington, D.C.

~ Far left: America's first vice president, and ~ second president, John Adams. @

.§. Left: A portrait of the third president,

~ Thomas Jefferson. a

if.

named vice president. The Founding Fathers seem to have believed this would ensure a credible, well-liked vice president and perhaps help provide for an orderly succession.

But the framers of the Constitution did not anticipate the creation of political parties. In 1797, Federalist John Adams became president and Thomas Jefferson of the Democrat-Republican party won the vice presidency. In office, Jefferson saw his role as that of an opposition leader and spent much of his time planning his campaign against Adams in the next election.

In the 1800 election, Jefferson and his running mate, Aaron Burr, were of the same political party. However, Burr and Jefferson each had received the same number of Electoral College votes, and Electoral College rules state that the House of Representatives votes to break a tie.

Burr decided he would seek the presidency rather than the vice presidency, creating animosity between the two as the House of Representatives voted more than 30 times before selecting Jefferson as the winner.

For more information: Vice president of the United States ttp:7/www.senate.gov artan history/history common/briefingNice President.htm 12th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution http://www .archives.gov/ exhibits/ charters/ constitution -amendments -11-27.html

Below left: Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, and Vice President Walter Mondale (right) during a fundraiser in Washington, D.C. in 1979.

Angry with Jefferson, Burr, as vice president, cast tie-breaking votes in the Senate that went against the president's wishes.

To avoid these types of problems in the future, Jefferson led the effort to pass the 12th Amendment to the Constitution in 1804. It required presidential and vice presidential candidates to run together on a ticket. The amendment also specified the qualifications for vice president, which are the same as for president: a natural-born U.S. citizen, at least 35 years old, with at least 14 years of residency in the United States.

Forming tickets became tricky political business. As party leaders met at conventions to nominate their candidates, leaders realized they could please party members by selecting a presidential nominee from one faction of the party and a vice presidential nominee from another. As a result, nominees often disagreed and vice presidents typically were relegated to minor roles. They also were often replaced when the president sought re-election.

The modem era of selecting vice presidents began in 1940, when president Franklin D. Roosevelt refused to run for a third term unless vice president John Nance Gamer was replaced with secretary of agriculture Henry Wallace. Party leaders agreed, nominating and voting for Wallace at the Democratic National Convention.

Only once since then has a presidential nominee left the decision on the vice presidential candidate to the national party convention. In 1956, Democratic candidate Adlai Stevenson let delegates decide between Senators Estes Kefauver and John F. Kennedy. Although Kefauver won in the party, the ticket lost the election.

Meanwhile, Kennedy gained valuable exposure that helped him win the presidency four years later.

While party leaders try to influence the choice, presidential candidates now tend to pick their running mates themselves,

quietly inviting potential vice presidential nominees for informal discussions and choosing the person with whom they feel most comfortable. In 1968, Republican candidate Richard Nixon let his stunned staff know of his decision to ask Maryland Governor Spiro Agnew to be his running mate just minutes before making his announcement to the country. It may have been a better idea to have allowed his team to vet the choice: In 1973, Agnew resigned because of criminal charges stemming from activities before his election.

Agnew is only the second vice president to resign. The first was John C. Calhoun, who, after being elected with president Andrew Jackson, decided to run for a vacant seat in the U.S. Senate, the upper house of Congress. He won, and gave up the vice presidency in 1832. ~ Michelle Austein is an America.gov staff writer. Laurinda Ke1jsLong also contributed to this article.

...: ®

Please share your views on this article. Write to editorspan@state.gov

I .

...

Who Became

:

~','~

Nine sitting vice presidents have had to succeed to the presidency during America's 232-year history: • John Tyler stepped in for William Henry Harrison, who died of pneumonia in 1841 ; • Millard Fillmore, for Zachary Taylor, who died suddenly in 1850; • Andrew Johnson, for Abraham Lincoln, assassinated in 1865; • Chester Arthur, for James Garfield, assassinated in 1881; • Theodore Roosevelt, for William McKinley, assassinated in 1901; • Calvin Coolidge, for Warren Harding, who died of a heart attack in 1923; • Harry Truman, for Franklin D. Roosevelt, who died of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1945; • Lyndon B. Johnson, for John F. Kennedy, assassinated in 1963; • Gerald R. Ford for Richard M. Nixon, who resigned in 1974.

•

I

~

alloons and bands playing in a big hall, TV reporters shouting questions to interviewees who are distracted by all the noise and hoopla, people wearing funny hats and waving flags, a chance for Americans to see folks from all across the country tell something special about their home states as they cast their support for their party's presidential nominee, charts with numbers toting up on the TV screen until, finally, the "magic number" of delegates has been reached and the Republican, or Democratic, party officially has a presidential nominee.

After waiting in a nearby hotel room or convention center suite, the candidate, his or her family and the vice presidential running mate, and that person's family, appear on stage to wild cheers. The balloons are released, the spouses are kissed and every-

8

Every four years, America's political parties gather to formally nominate their candidates for president. Why should the fact that the candidates have been known for weeks, and are already campaigning against each other, spoil the chance of a good party? one raises their hands together for the same happy photo taken every four years.

This is the scene Americans see when they watch on television the conventions held by the two major political parties every four years to formally nominate their choices for president and vice president. It may seem a little silly, because nowadays the person who has won the most delegates is known weeks in advance. But it still gives a chance for the party to showcase its candidates, not only for president and vice

president, but for the U.S. Congress and for state elections, and to focus on differences with the opposition.

Highlights of the conventions include a rousing keynote speech by party leaders, usually the announcement of the nominee's vice presidential candidate, the roll call of delegate votes by the state delegations, and the fmal negotiation and ratification of the party platform (the document that states its positions and plans).

In the past, there was usually more

their power, persuaded state legislatures to abolish them on the grounds that they were expensive and that relatively few people participated in them. By 1936, only a dozen states continued to hold presidential primaries.

But democratizing pressures reemerged after World War II. For the first time, television provided a medium through which excitement, as the chairman of each state people could now see the political camdelegation would rise, and after the horns paigns in their living rooms. The decades stopped hooting and the flags stopped that followed brought refOlllis to widen parswooshing overhead, would announce how ticipation in party nominating conventions. many delegate votes were being cast. And it was fun to hear something about that As a result, all states now hold primary state's official pie or favorite bird or induselections or caucuses, or a combination of try. If the primary and caucus voting was both to select delegates to the major party close, there would be huddled meetings nominating conventions. Depending on the throughout the convention center, as candilaws of the state and the rules of the party, dates' representatives tried to woo some of primary voters may cast a ballot for a canthe uncommitted, and even the conmlitted didate, or a slate of delegates pledged to vote for that person at the national convendelegates. Sometimes, a losing candidate would agree to let the vote be unanimous in tion, or they may be choosing delegates to return for some pet policy being included attend a county or state convention first, with the national convention delegates in the party platform, or being chosen as selected from that group. Although this systhe vice presidential nominee, or promised a Cabinet post. tem takes place over several months, the But even as the process of selecting cancandidate preferences are essentially deter:j, mined in the first round of voting. didates has evolved over the decades into a show that most U.S. television networks no ~ The size of any state's delegation to the ~ national nominating convention is calculated longer cover "gavel to gavel," surprises can emerge. In 2004, a big surprise was the stir~ on the basis of a fOllliula established by each iilparty that includes such considerations as the ring speech delivered by a young state sen! state's population, its past support for the ator from Illinois, Barack Obama, who in , . party's national candidates, and the number that moment made his appearance on the of elected officials and party leaders serving national stage. Four years later, he is the Democratic Party's presidential nominee. in public office from that state. The allocation The U.S. Constitution provides no rules formula that the Democrats use results in for how political parties select their candiconventions that have about twice as many dates. In fact, there were no political parties delegates as those of the Republicans. when the Constitution was written in the One consequence of the changes in the nomination process has been the deoreasing late 1700s. "importance of the party's climactic, teleBut by 1796, members of the U.S. ~ vised, national nominating convention.

Congress were identifying with one or ~ Today, the presidential nominee is effectiveanother of the political parties of the time, 8 ly deternlined by the voters relatively early and meeting informally to agree on their j party's presidential and vice presidential co in the primary elections process. Many . . .

Top: Delegates Humberto O'Neal (left) Americans tune in only on the last day to norrunees. Know.n thIS an d L'II' Bid . as King Caucus, .

I zana e ar oed O'N eaI,0 1tJ1e watch the acceptance speech of the presidensystem for selectmg party candIdates conI I d t th Rbi' Nt' I vzrgm s an s, a e epu lean a zona tial nominee. That's also a change from the tinued until 1824. It broke down because of Convention. past. Originally, the presidential candidates the decentralization of power in politics Above: Fireworks explode on the final day of stayed away from the conventions. But that accompanied the westward expansion the Democratic National Convention. of the United States.

Franklin D. Roosevelt broke that tradition by Eventually, the caucus was replaced by delegates. Primary elections came into attending the Democratic PaIty convention national nominating conventions. The first being to do just this. By 1916, more than in 1932. It was a good move: He won the one was held in 1831 by a minor party, the half the states held presidential primaIies. nomination, and the presidency.

Anti-Masons, who met in a saloon in The movement was short-lived, however. This article is taken from the U.S. Department Following the end of World War I, party lead- of State publication, USA Elections in Brief, Baltimore, Maryland, to choose candidates and write a platform on which they would ers, who knew the plimaries were a threat to with contributions by Laurinda Keys Long.

Far left: John McCain with his running mate, Sarah Palin, at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Left: Joe Biden (from left), his wife, Jill, Michelle and Barack Obama at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado.

run. The next year, the Democrats met in the same saloon to select their nominees.

Since then, the major parties and most minor parties have held nominating conventions, attended by state delegates.

Throughout the 19th and into the 20th century, the presidential nominating conventions, though attended by many of the party faithful, were controlled by state party leaders. These political "bosses" had used their influence to handpick their state's convention delegates-and to make sure that they voted "correctly" at the national party convention. Although there were lengthy public speeches and debates, much business, such as on policy and Cabinet appointments, was conducted by cigarette-smoking party leaders and key supporters in private meetings that became known as smoke-filled rooms, and entered the American language as a political cliche.

At the turn of the century, opponents to the party leaders demanded reforms to permit ordinary voters to select convention

l

ll'

.

4l

Presidential spouses play important role in American politics

The First La ies

By KELLY BRONK

ne of the highest-profile jobs in U.S. government comes with no official duties, no paycheck and is awarded based on family connections. But first lady of the United States is a job with almost limitless possibilities.

Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, wrote a daily newspaper column and hosted a weekly radio program during her husband's term. Claudia (Lady Bird) Johnson, wife of President Lyndon B. Johnson, promoted environmental conservation. Cun'ent first lady Laura Bush has championed women's rights and promoted reading programs.

Hillary Clinton's experience in the White House gave her valuable name recognition that helped her win a seat in the U.S. Senate and become the first presidential spouse to run for president.

Each brought her personal style and passions to a post Patricia Nixon, wife of President Richard Nixon, described in a 1972 news conference as "the hardest unpaid job in the world."

In the United States, the role of first lady is an unelected, unpaid position without constitutional responsibilities. But the first lady, who acts as White House hostess, is also highly influential.

American first ladies are political celebrities, according to Myra Gutin, a first lady historian and professor of communications at Rider University in New Jersey. "If they go somewhere, if they advocate an idea, if they use the White House podium and say, 'I care about this,' it's something that gets a lot of attention," Gutin says. "Other first ladies around the world are not treated in the same manner."

O

first ladies in waiting

Above left: Former first ladies (from left) Claudia (Lady Bird) Johnson, Patricia Nixon, Nancy Reagan and Barbara Bush (standing), Rosalynn Carter and Betty Ford at the dedication of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in 1991.

Above: Incoming first lady Laura Bush (left) with Hillary Clinton at the White House in 2000.

Besides attesting to their husbands' character, the wives provide support and guidance to their husbands. "History has shown that they provide wise, intuitive and often bluntly honest advice to their husbands," Anthony says. The campaigns offer voters a glimpse of what kind of first lady a candidate's wife might be.

Michelle Obama According to Gutin, Obama would be an activist first lady, someone likely to be involved in policy decisions. "She certainly seems to be someone who would take advantage of the podium the White House affords her," Gutin says. "She is bright, she is articulate, and she has professional experiences in management."

Obama, 44, is a Chicago native who received her undergraduate degree in sociology from Princeton University in New Jersey, and later earned a law degree from Harvard University in Massachusetts. After graduation, she worked at a Chicago law firm where she met Barack Obama. They malTied in 1992.

Since leaving corporate law to pursue a career in public service, Obarna has held several positions in the Chicago govemment, and helped found Public Allies Chicago, an organization that encourages young people to choose careers in the public sector.

Most recently, Obama served as vice president of community and external affairs at the University of Chicago Medical Center in Illinois. "Michelle Obama's position as a hospital administrator has given her experience in the practicalities and realities of delivering health care in the United States," says Anthony.

In the United States, a presidential candidate's wife commands attention on the campaign trail, something Cindy McCain, wife of Republican presidential nominee John McCain, and Michelle Obama, wife of Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee, understand well.

A spouse is one of many factors Americans consider when decid- Cindv McCain McCain also has experience that would help her in the role of ing which candidate deserves their votes. "Candidates' wives open a first lady, Gutin says, but predicts she would be less of an activist window into the role that the men play in their families and provide a than Obama. "She certainly has the crereflection of their husbands' character," says dentials, but I don't see her getting Carl Sferrazza Anthony, historian at the National First Ladies' Library, Ohio involved in public policy," Gutin says.

National First Ladies' Library in Ohio, and Iittp://www.firstlaoies.org7inoex.litm Instead, McCain, 54, probably would author of books on presidential fanlilies.

First Ladies Gallery htt ://www.whitehouse.gov/histor /firstla ies/

Above: Cindy McCain with a baby at Da Khoa Tinh Khanh Hoa General Hospital in Vietnam.

Above right: Michelle Obama with a young patient at San Jorge Children's Hospital, in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

devote her attention to humanitarian work, perhaps as an advocate for children's health care issues. "Cindy McCain has experience working with international charities and going to many areas of the world that are considerably less advantaged than the United States, which gives her a unique perception of the reality of life around the world," Anthony says.

McCain attended the University of Southern California, where she earned an undergraduate degree in education and a master's degree in special education. After graduation, she taught disabled children in her home state of Arizona. She met John McCain while vacationing in Hawaii and they married in 1980.

In 1988, McCain founded the American Voluntary Medical Team, a nonprofit organization that coordinates humanitarian aid trips for medical professionals. She has also worked with international nongovernmental organizations including HALO, Operation Smile and CARE. She chairs the board of Hensley & Company, a family beer-distribution business.

No matter who assumes the role of first lady, it is likely the president's wife will continue to perform an essential function: Providing a voice of moderation for her husband.

"She is the one person that can turn to the president and say, 'You're full of baloney and be quiet,''' Gutin says. "In a place like the White House, it's very valuable to have a voice of reason and one that is not connected to a particular political point of view."

The Indian American Voler Young and old on the campaign trail for U.S. presidential candidates.

ince 1956, when Dalip Singh Saund became the first Indian American elected to the U.S. Congress-after a hard-fought battle to rescind a law prohibiting people born in Asia from becoming U.S. citizens-Indian Americans have gained a stronger voice in politics. Even though Indian Americans account for only 2.5 million among the 300 million U.S. citizens, their political influence is growing.

The Indian community now understands that it will have to be involved in u the political process, says Meera Gandhi, a ~ Manhattan philanthropist and socialite. ~ "We are the new, wealthy kids on the <3 block, so to speak. We feel we should have ~ a stake in our country's politics," she told ~ the New York Sun. In 2007, Republican ~ Congressman Bobby Jindal was elected U governor of Louisiana; Neera Tanden, Senator Hillary Clinton's senior policy adviser during her campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, has now joined the camp of Barack Obama, as the senator's domestic policy director; and

S

Hollywood actor Kalpen Modi, also known as Kal Penn, is putting his career on hold to campaign for Obama.

Not surprisingly, both the Democratic and Republican parties have been reaching out to Indian American voters. Says Sanjay Puri, chairman of the Washington, D.C.based U.S. India Political Action Committee (USINPAC), a national bipartisan organization: "The Indian American community is a very prosperous and well educated one that

For more information: Indian American Forum for Political Education http://www. iafpe.org/ US. India Political Action Committee http://www.usinpac.com/

Above: Michelle Obama with Surabhi Garg of the U.S. India Political Action Committee at afundraiser in Chicago, Illinois.

Above right: Actor Kal Penn (right) works as a floor whip at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado. is passionately engaged in the public space and in the American political process." The group estimates that Indian Ameticans will contribute $20 million during the current presidential campaign.

Many Indian Americans are actively involved in fundraising efforts for the two major political parties. Some 300,000 Indian Americans in California's Silicon Valley are credited with having had a significant impact on campaign financing for both the Clinton and Obama campaigns.

Sant Chatwal, a New York hotelier and restaurant owner, formed Indian Americans for Hillary 2008 and raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for her White House bid. After Barack Obama's victory in the

fight for the Democratic nomination, Chatwal pledged to raise $10 million.

The children of the politically awakened first generation of Indian Americans-the major immigration wave began in the 1960s-will also be influential in the future. According to the U.S. census, half of Asian Americans are younger than 29, and of these, Indian Americans are the fastest growing ethnic group, with an annual growth rate of 10.5 percent. Voters in the age group of 18 to 30 now number 50 million, about a quarter of the electorate.

Daniel Schorr, a senior news analyst and commentator for National Public Radio, finds it "electrifying" that more young people have expressed a desire to vote in this year's election than before. Increased voter turnout among young people in 2008, as shown during the primary season, is an "important new fact," says SChOtT. The youth vote could decide the election, he says. Polls suggest a majority of young Americans support Obama over John

McCain, the Republican Party candidate.

Indian Americans have historically supported Democratic over Republican candidates. But that is changing. India Abroad reported in February 2008, that while 60 per cent of Indian Americans are still Democrats, 40 per cent are Republicans, the highest percentage so far. And the Republicans see an opportunity to draw support from this ethnic group. Jay Nordlinger, senior editor of National Review, recently wrote in the bi-weekly, conservative maga-

grows, the Indian American support to both political parties will be balanced equally."

The U.S. India Political Action Committee's Puri says this election has brought out the second generation, which has historically stayed away. "I think this is a testament to Senator Obama, who has gone out for the second generation of Indian Americans, just as he has done with so many other young people in very different communities. His appeal to the young population is just tremendous." ~ z ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 8

zine that "Indian Americans are entrepreneurial, hard-working, striving, traditionalist, family-oriented, religious, assimilationist, patriotic-what could be better? And what are their issues? They are proponents of probusiness, low tax, pro-trade policy making, and free trade, which includes a robust defense of outsourcing." Nordlinger says these values are enslnined in the Republican policy platforms.

Narender Reddy, a pioneer fundraiser for the Republican Party in Georgia and president of the Indian American Forum for Political Education, an organization dedicated to encouraging political activism among Indian Americans, says that "while 95 percent of the fIrst generation routinely supported the Democratic Party, I see a change in the second generation. They are more open to considering the Republican Party. I would guess that at least about 30 percent of the second generation is supporting the Republican Party. I strongly believe, as the number of the second generation

Above left: Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal campaigns for John McCain in Kenner, Louisiana.

Above: McCain with Harmeet Dhillon, Republican candidate for the California State Assembly from the 13th Assembly District.

The millennial youth-those under 30-are the most diverse American generation in history, with almost 40 percent identifying themselves as a minority.

Natasha Lal, 19, of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, says, "My affinity toward Obama springs from the fact that he is the underdog. He didn't come from an upper crust white American family, and being (myself) in the minority, it is reassuring to see that anything is possible."

Arjun Seth, 22, also of Emory, says Obama seems "more convincing than McCain, especially given that he lived in Indonesia and thus would be more likely to understand and view a policy from not only an American perspective, but also

from an international one."

But Raghav Dhawan, 21, of Claremont McKenna College in California, is leaning heavily toward McCain. He is most concerned about the war in Iraq and trade. He believes these issues are closely tied to America's relationship with the rest of the world and feels that McCain would strengthen those relationships. "He is sympathetic on immigration and moderate on global warming. He believes outsourcing is the natural result of free market forces and would follow Bush on supporting the nuclear deal," says Dhawan.

Others, like Jay Raghavan, a student at the University of Pennsylvania, see strengths in each candidate on specifIc issues. He likes Obama's stand on Iraq, but prefers McCain's on trade and international economics.

Indian American youth are not just forming opinions but are also actively participating in politics, raising funds, joining in campaigns and volunteering. Data from the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement, based at Tufts University in Massachusetts, suggests that among the youth, Asian Americans are the most politically active ethnic group. In 2006, 54 percent of young Asian Americans repOlted volunteering. In addition, a little over one-third of 18- to 29year-old Asian American citizens turned out to vote in 2004, the largest voter turnout of Asian Americans in that age group since 1972, when such voting data began to be collected.

The politically awakened fIrst generation has pressed upon its children the importance of being involved in the political process.

"Being from the largest democracy in the world, the Indian people have a long history with the democratic process and understand the value of their right to vote," says Florida Congressman Gus Bilirakis, a member of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans and the House Subcommittee on Middle East and South Asia. 'Thus, when it comes to their participation in the election of America's next president, Indian Americans share in the dual heritage of their ancestors in India and that of their home country here in the United States."

An -----~ Caitlin Fennerty wrote this article while working as a Public Affairs intern at the American Center in New Delhi. Abigail Thornhill contributed research to the article.

J..:,

'/ij)V6

":

·<:b~,:v~'-oi·{

"May I recommend the diet plate? It's zero-calorie, zero-cholesterol and "If you need a reference I'll give you my mother's phone numbel:"

zero-taste.

"

Copyright © Tribune Media Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

Copyright © Tribune Media Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

"A personal leave is no problem-how

many

nanoseconds will you require?"

Copyright © Tribune Media Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

Copyright © The New Yorker Collection 2005.

Mick Stevens from calloonbank.com.

All rights reserved.

[ Lena Khan l

Tackling Social Issues WHh ~ \ ~

jJ JJJJ

~ JJ J JJ lJ j1J r

~J

",

By SERENA KIM

..

n a parched afternoon in Los Angeles, California, LenaKhan peruses the aisles of Hand Prop Room, a company that supplied props for Hollywood movies such as The Aviator and The Departed. From faux carcasses to bronze Buddhas, the shelves are stuffed with gizmos and curiosities. Khan unsheathes a ninja sword with a mischievous look. "This will work," she says.

Though she defies expectations of what a typical filmmaker looks like-she is young, female, devoutly Muslim and Indian American-the 24-year-old UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles) School of Theater, Film and Television graduate writes and directs music videos and short films, as well as commercials.

Khan's father is from Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, and her mother is from Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh.

They emigrated to Canada more than 30 years ago, and moved to the United States 23 years ago.

Khan won $5,000 for Bassem is Trying, a one-minute short that humorously demonstrates how a Muslim American man tries to fit in, by blasting hip-hop music on his car radio. Her three-minute short A Land Called Paradise, set

O

to a song of the same name by Muslim country singer Kareem Salama, won a $20,000 grand prize in 2007 from One Nation, an American group that seeks to clear misperceptions about Muslims in the United States and sponsored the film competition. Khan directed dozens of people of diverse backgrounds to hold up handwritten signs that say what they would like the world to know about them as Muslim Americans. The statements are as whimsical as "I, too, shop at Victoria's Secret," or as serious as "My sister died on September 11 ."

One of the judges, former professional basketball player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, gave A Land Called Paradise high marks for its "beautiful cinematic language," while journalist Mariane Pearl commended the film "for its freshness and sense of humor while addressing vital emotions felt by the Muslim population and the rest of us."

Pulling off A Land Called Paradise was a major effort, Khan recalls. It started with a question: "If you could say something to everybody in the world who is not Muslim, what would you say?

"I sent out e-mails; I went to mosques; I used every major Muslim Listserv I could think of," she says. The first response Khan received was "Islam inhibits my suicidal thoughts."

"That's when I knew that this

was the video I was going to do," she says. "I was trying to fix the representations of Muslims, but I don't think I can speak for all of them. And this was my first clue. I got 2,500 responses, collected them, narrowed them down and made the video."

Since the video's launch, Khan has received hundreds of e-mails from people who say it has made them cry, inspired them to open a discussion about Islam with their families or broken down walls built by stereotypes.

Khan became interested in cinema as a form of social activism, which she considers an important tenet of her faith. »: As an undergraduate majoring § in political science and history at ~ UCLA, Khan noticed that students ~ I I I , • would. become interested in people who are going through qenoctdes such as those In those things." She went on to Rwanda and Darfur only If they get a masters degree in film at saw a movie about the topic or if UCLA. an actor publicized the ?ause. She Back at Hand Prop Room, was also tired of seeing Holly- Khan digs into a box of ninja wood films such as The Siege and stars. Once she has selected her BlackHawk Down which she .felt props, she drives over to Western use? Images to connect terrorism Costume Company in search of to ritual ablutions and the call to ninja masks and suits. prayer.

In addition to her ninja com"These things ate at me. So I mercials, her future projects decided that Instead of com- include a set of commercials plaining about them, I wo~ld about the presidential election enter the field and do something and another music video for about it," Khan says "I wanted Salama.Ak .. to make movies about social ~ issues because ...tpat's when Serena Kim is a special correpeople really listen and relate to spondent for America.gov

c.a

= ••• z

15 15 •••

NanJing Ko Taiwan GM d to pro It is so wonderful to learn that you are using see. stect papaya from virus infection However, .papaya rln~spo~~~ t the only virus we have in the lield. I strongly sugges we ~~e combination of plant health management and GM Plands~o combat existing pr~~~~:~;~~~ ~~~deev~~/~~~c;l~bo~~~nar~in; age to our enVIron hes instead .

Isn't it better to use more integrated approac . single measure to control pathogens? I hope thiS helps

~t~~~

Sultan Ahmed Ismail Chenndi.

I sincerely appreciate lhattheauthor has been candid in framing the title as I would wish to ask the same question "Will a genetically modified papaya seed help Indian Maneesh Kumar New Delhi .

It's good to know that genetic engineering proVides a more prefarmers?" The story in the magazine projects a rosy picture. I would appreciate if the cise way of obtaining the desired traits In a plant. nature of tests conducted by the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University were also revealed in that article. I am afraid they might confine their experiments only to "viral resistance." How does this technology alter the coat of the leaf, petiole, trunk and root and puttaraj A. Choukimath Mumbai.

US The article shows how best we can benefit from the Indo- . . in what way? Are there experiments to study the soil quality, microbial and faunal density and diversity in those plantations? Papaya seeds are someagricultural research cooperation times used as an adulterant in black pepper What would be \';:'~ its impact on such accidental human consumption?

Devendra Mulji ~:::"'Your article mentions" .... James says that case actualMehta ly shows that the system works, that a gene found to Baroda, Gujarat cause an allergy can be identified and removed." When?

I like this article After it had caused allergy to some human beings? How the most becould (Mr. James) be so optimistic ... as to state, "Moncause it gives santo will net come back and say, 'You owe us some royan insight on a alties now that the 10 years is over' "? What happens if new science by they do decide to ask, in case India by 2020 becomes a creating awareWill 8 .---_ .. """_..... ..• ;.:..:;-~ lead producer of such papaya? ness to reduce Papaya Seed Help Indian farmersY With so many open ended questions, on one side I \ food shortages f?jj~':;=;' feel sad that TNAU as an institution of several years sucin the future. .. - ... ..•--cumbs to borrow technology, and that, too, not a sustainable one, while on the other I congratulate you on framing the title with an element of doubt.

Indian papaya production.

GeneUCaUy Modi1ied

l

,~~F.::J ;Z~:-~~ ---~-.---

~~;g~:o~.§~5~~

S. Raghunatha Prabhu Alfpu~~:/:~~/~ther articles on space topics were very "Exploring New Frontiers oge. . . cin as well as a good source of refinformative, interesting and curiosity l~dU dg~ther sketches and pictures are a erence The accompanying Phot~grap ~:;s' horizons Adding profiles of a few collector's delight and help broa en rea. d eful astronauts would have been very appropriate an us .

Nirmalendu Chakraborty Cooch Behar, West Bengal It is superb to get a mosaic of 53 images of the moon's surface containing mineral compositions. A really splendid cover.

Chinmay Anand Paul Balasore, Orissa he reader from start to linish. Deepaniali It is absorbing, griPPing the Interfefst~f strated with photos that bespeak the Kakati has presented an array 0 ac s I u Indo-US. ioint venture in space missions

\1

I ~I

Tasneem Zainullmani Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu It is quite colorful and has an interesting caption to go along with the picture.

Anjani Kumar Sinha New Delhi I rate it a seven for its accuracy have more aesthetic appeal

However, the cover should

Tukaram Santram Mote Aurangabad, Maharashtra The photography is very high quality. Science and technology will help to find precious minerals on the moon.

60

Air Marshal P.V. Naik, vice

chief of air staff in the Indian Air Force (right) talks with U.S. Air Force Lt. General Loyd Utterback, during the Red Flag joint exercise in Nellis, Nevada in August. It was the first time India had participated in this realistic combat training exercise that the U.S. Air Force holds with different countries.

Fulbright scholar Kavita A. Sharma's book, Internationalization of Higher Education: An Aspect of India's Foreign Relations, was released at the American Center in August by Jane Schukoske, adviser to the Haryana-based Jindal Global Law School. Sharma is the director of the India International Centre in New Delhi. The event included a panel discussion on higher education.

Indian and Pakistani teenagers met with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte in Washington, D.C., after their three-week Seeds of Peace conflict resolution course in Otisfield, Maine this summer. Also present on the occasion was Indian Ambassador to the United States Ronen Sen Through dialogue, sports and art activities, the 32 young people formed bonds and learned skills to help them move their societies toward reconciliation. Seeds of Peace started in 1993, and has been bringing South Asian youngsters together since 2001, with support from the U.S. State Department.