Join the conversation! Each week a conversation group meets in the Municipal Building to discuss a timely topic or aspect of U.S. society. The conversations happen on Tuesdays from 12:00 – 1:00 PM in the Municipal Building at 243 S. Allen Street. Email the group leader Bob Persiko for more information at [email protected].
Please join us for the October meeting of Global Connections on October 2, 2019 from 6:30 – 8:30 in Canterbury Hall in St. Andrews Church located in downtown State College. RSVP to the Facebook event to get a reminder and updates!
All are welcome to join in the fall kick-off session of a weekly discussion group called Making Sense of the American Experience on Tuesday, August 27 from 12:00 – 1:00 PM in room 201 of the State College Municipal Building (243 S. Allen St).
The topic for this session is racism, white supremacy, white nationalist, and other terms that have appeared frequently in the news in the past several weeks. President Trump was accused in certain media of being a racist, and one journal said that anyone who supports Trump is also a racist. White supremacists have been labeled by some as domestic terrorists. We will try to define these terms and discuss how they are interpreted and understood in the context of current events. We’ll also explore how these terms relate to what’s happening in other countries.
Discussion group meetings are free and open to the public. Both Americans and internationals are welcome to join in the discussion. If you can’t make this session, don’t worry! This group meets on a weekly basis and you can come when you can.
If you’d like a reminder about this event, please respond to the Facebook event.
Save the date for the kick-off membership meeting of Global Connections: September 4th from 6:30 – 8:30. Please see the Facebook event for more information. We hope you can join us!
BB&T Bank has asked Global Connections to post job openings available in the State College area. They are searching for bi- and multi-lingual speakers to allow them to communicate with its international speakers more efficiently. We will be occasionally post job openings that require fluency in languages other than English. Please feel free to contact the person responsible as noted in the job posting.
Global Connections has no relationship with any employers other than to help them seek out prospective employees with specific skills. We cannot answer any questions relative to the positions posted.
Please contact Stephanie Gerber – person responsible for handling applications. Her contact information is, [email protected] if you are interested in learning more about these positions.
Global Connections’ English language classes provide individuals with the opportunity to practice English speaking and listening skills in an informal classroom setting. Check out the fall class schedule to learn more.
Perhaps some international visitors to State College receive a formal orientation to American society and culture before they come here, and perhaps others have taken courses in American studies. In general, it is more likely that there are gaps in what such visitors know about the complexity and diversity of their host country.
The Global Connections small group Making Sense of the American Experience is designed to help fill those gaps. Each week, we discuss an issue inspired by current events, a participant’s question, or a national study. Our topics have ranged far and wide: gun violence and gun control, elections, the opioid crisis, immigration, the American dream, and freedom of expression, just to name a few.
Each session is a forum in which American residents in our community and people from other nations living here exchange views. In this way, everyone becomes a learner, hopefully better informed about the world and the diversity of views and values that motivate all of us.
Occasionally, we invite a guest speaker to lead the discussion. A Native American who works at Penn State and her teenage daughter told us about life on reservations and current concerns. An African American undergraduate shared her insights on race relations. The director of the Centre County Women’s Resource Center (now Centre Safe) told us about domestic abuse. A “native’ Pennsylvanian explained who the Pennsylvania Dutch are.
I would like to think that by-products of the discussion are greater empathy and sensitivity to perspectives and cultural values of others. We welcome any and all to join us on Tuesdays, noon to 1:00 PM, at the Municipal Building. Sessions have been paused for the summer, but we will start up again in the fall.