Sen Lin Hu Celebrates 25 Years

The Chinese Language Village, Sen Lin Hu, continues to pave the way in Chinese language and culture immersion learning. Opening in 1984 as one of only two immersion programs in the country, "it was very far ahead of its time," says Patricia Thornton, director of summer youth programs.

"This concept of immersion instruction in Mandarin was almost unheard of," she says. "And now it's become one of our fastest growing Villages."

With an enthusiastic staff fluent in Chinese, including several native speakers, Sen Lin Hu exposes villagers to the rich Chinese culture through art, games, dance, song, sports and authentic cuisine. At its site on Cass Lake in Minnesota, the Village offers programming for youth, as well as adults and families.

Sen Lin Hu celebrated its 25th anniversary during a July 10 program and later that day during the International Day celebration near Bemidji.

Read more about Chinese programming at the Language Villages and Concordia in the next issue of Concordia Magazine.

Scholarship and Activities

Dr. Karla Knutson (English) defended her dissertation, "Innocence and Innocents in Middle English Literature and Its Reception," at the University of Kansas, Lawrence, passing with honors.

Dr. Stephen Grollman (German) presented "Nietzsch's Wagner: A Monumental Shift from Du to Ich" at the Kentucky Foreign Language Conference, University of Kentucky, Lexington.

Jennifer DeJong (nursing) passed her oral and written examinations, becoming ABD toward her doctorate in education at North Dakota State University. She passed her advanced practice board examination and was recertified as a family nurse practitioner in primary care and family health nursing by the American Nurses' Credentialing Center. She also presented "Legal Liability and SOAP Documentation Guidelines: A Public Health Nurse's Roll" to the Cass Public Health Department.

Dr. Jennifer Bath (biology) presented a paper, "Assessing the Potential Drugability of Hp-FAR-1, from a FAR Protein Family Specific to the Phylum Nematoda," at the 48th annual nematology meeting in Burlington, Vt. The paper was co-authored by Concordia students Jeremy Drees '09, Daniel Ram '09, Megan Knox '10, Erin Maetzold '10, Michael Scheidt '10, Peace Eneh '10 and Colin Clark '11. The same group of students conducted research for the paper "Production of a His-Tag Recombinant FAR Protein Analysis of the Lifecycle Stages of Hp-FAR-1" presented at the 2009 annual meeting of the North Dakota Academy of Science.

Dr. Michelle Lelwica (religion) presented a paper, "Embodying Contemplative Learning: Aikido as a Case Study," at the Contemplative Heart of Higher Education Conference in Amherst, Mass.

Dr. Michael Wohlfeil (education) and Kay Schneider (assessment) presented a session titled "Advancing the Academic Agenda: Collaboration Between Academic Departments and The Office of Assessment and Institutional Research" at the 49th Association for Institutional Research annual meeting in Atlanta.

Dr. Francisco Cabello's (Spanish and Hispanic studies) paper, "Ritual Festivo e Identidad Individual en la Semana Santa de Sevilla" (Festive Ritual and Individual Identity in Seville's Holy Week) has been published both in CD-ROM and online at www.naaas.org. It was published by the NAAAS & Affiliates, including the National Association of Hispanic & Latino Studies, in the 2008 monograph series containing select presentations from the 2008 national conference.

Please send scholarship and activities submissions to kappes@cord.edu.

A Camp for Healing, Fun

For a few days in August, Concordia's Olson Forum served as an ark of sorts for area elementary-aged students.

About 90 children attended Camp Noah, a weeklong day camp designed for kids who have lived through natural disasters. Five Moorhead ELCA churches hosted the camp for students who experienced this spring's flood.

"At the time, we were so focused on fighting the flood that we didn't have time to focus on the emotional needs of our kids," says Dave Traaseth '84, the camp's coordinator. "This gave them a chance to process what happened."

The level of support children need after a disaster varies, says Dr. Susan Cordes-Green, who teaches psychology at Concordia and provided training for the camp staff. Some needed a supportive environment to help them work through some of the aftereffects of the flood. For others, camp was a nice break from home.

But mostly, the kids had fun. It was a camp, after all.

Northern Lights

Dozens of area women honed their leadership skills during the annual Tri-College NEW Leadership Development Institute hosted by Concordia. Read the story at www.concordiacollege.edu/feature.