International Dateline
Spring 1999
In This Issue:
Class of '99
U of M international grads from all the colleges were honored May 14 in the Great Hall of Coffman Union. See their class photo!
Professor Mestenhauser honored by Czech president
Josef Mestenhauser, long-time professor of international education, was named honorary consul for his native country Apr. 26. Czech President Vaclav Havel also honored Mestenhauser with a presidential medal during a visit to the Twin Cities, recognizing Mestenhauser's service to the Czech Republic, especially in the process of rebuilding the education system after communism.
International Graduation Celebration
Class of '99! Students from across the campus attended the international graduation celebration on Friday, May 14.
HERE'S THE NEWS RELEASE
The fifth annual graduation celebration for international students will honor students from around the world receiving University of Minnesota degrees this year — September 1998 through all of 1999.
This year the celebration will be held in the Great Hall of Coffman Union, from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m.
Students are invited to attend along with their faculty advisers, family members, and friends.
The celebration is held following Graduate School commencement, but it will honor students from all colleges receiving bachelor's, master's, and doctor's degrees. In past years, many students have attended with their parents who were visiting the United States for the first time to attend commencement.
A short program will begin at 4 p.m., and a class photo will be taken between 4:30 and 5 p.m.
This annual celebration is sponsored by International Student and Scholar Service (ISSS) and the Office of International Programs (OIP), which are part of the Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost.
For more information contact Cheri Thompson at ISSS, c-thom@tc.umn.edu or 612-624-8350.
See the story and photos about last year's celebration
G. Marty, Office of International Programs, May 10, 1999
U of M professor Mestenhauser named Czech honorary consul, conferred presidential medal by Vaclav Havel Apr. 26
Josef Mestenhauser, professor of international education, College of Education and Human Development at the University of Minnesota, was appointed honorary consul of the Czech Republic for the Midwest region of the United States in a ceremony in St. Paul on Apr. 26.
Mestenhauser, a native of the Czech Republic, is an internationally recognized leader in the field of international education and multiple Fulbright winner.
As honorary consul he is entrusted to act on behalf of the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs in protection of the interests of the Czech Republic and its citizens in Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, and Wisconsin.
The position was conferred by the Czech deputy minister for foreign affairs while accompanying President Vaclav Havel during a visit to the Twin Cities to inaugurate an annual lecture series on civil society.
In a surprise move, Havel also conferred upon Mestenhauser a Presidential Silver Medal — normally reserved for key Czechslovak associations abroad — at a public ceremony.
Mestenhauser fled his home country in 1948 after receiving a sentence for political activism against the Communist government. After the "Velvet Revolution" in 1989, he was among a group of Czech exiles invited by the new Havel government to return to receive degrees they had earned.
During Mestenhauser's first years in the United States as a political refugee, he earned a doctoral degree in political science at the University of Minnesota. His subsequent work related to international student and scholar issues and leadership development programs at Minnesota since the post-war period — and his consistently interdisciplinary focus — brought him to national and international leadership in international education.
Mestenhauser was active locally in founding the Minnesota International Center (MIC), and nationally in promoting the development of the National Association for Foreign Student Affairs (NAFSA). He eventually served as national president of NAFSA:Association of International Educators.
His most recent Fulbright award in 1991-92 engaged Mestenhauser in higher education reform in the Czech and Slovak Republic as the country was dividing into two separate nations.
This summer he will lead a study group funded through Fulbright for teachers and educators to study education in the post-Soviet nations of Belarus and the Kyrgyz Republic in addition to the Czech Republic. [Note: Applications for the study group may still be available for this six-week tour.]
Mestenhauser can be contacted at j-mest@tc.umn.edu or 612-624-8350.
Related articles:
"Czech & Slovak America: Quo Vadis?" campus conference (Apr. 24-25, 1999)
First Fulbright study group to Belarus, Czech and Kyrgyz Republics (Summer 1998)
Reforming the Higher Education Curriculum, Mestenhauser and Ellingboe, eds., American Council on Education/Oryx Press, 1998
The occasion of Mestenhauser's return to receive his juris doctor degree in 1991 was recorded by local author and Regents' Professor Patricia Hampl in the afterword to the second edition of her book, A Romantic Education (Houghton Mifflin, 1992) and published in the New York Times Book Review (March 22, 1992).
G. Marty, Office of International Programs, May 5, 1999