NEWS
November 14, 2008UK Asia Center Celebrates Successes
UK faculty, staff, friends and supporters gathered on Thursday, November 13 to celebrate the recent successes of the UK Asia Center. Provost Kumble Subbaswamy commended the Asia Center on its ability to harness faculty expertise across various Colleges, its contributions to Asian Studies at UK and its focus on K-12 initiatives across the Commonwealth. “With these advances, UK continues to solidify its standing as a global research university, and to demonstrate its commitment to bringing international study and research opportunities, as well as greater cultural awareness, to Kentucky students,” he said. The Provost also praised the center’s track record in grant writing, in particular for securing $559,000 in foundation grants in 2007- 2008.
“The Asia Center is a model for the kind of initiative we are fostering at UK, harnessing faculty interest and expertise across various Colleges and aggressively seeking external funding, matched by internal dollars, in order to expand opportunities for students,” said Subbaswamy.
The Center successfully involves faculty research initiatives, expanded faculty for teaching a broader array of courses, education-abroad opportunities for students, and enhancement of the co-curriculum, which benefits the UK community as well as the broader statewide community.
Many UK Colleges, including Arts & Sciences, Fine Arts, Education, Engineering, and Agriculture have collaborated actively on Asia Center projects, and this support has been key to the success of their efforts. The center has also partnered with the Office of International Affairs, the new program in International Studies, the Honors program, the Libraries, the Development Office, Student Affairs and other on-campus units to create a very successful collaboration that reaches many students and faculty.
The Asia Center has not kept its focus only on campus enrichment, but also on UK’s commitment to the state as a land-grant institution. Many of the organization’s grants focus on the training of teachers, to bring more Asian languages to the P-12 classrooms across Kentucky. This will enrich the Commonwealth, and also bring to the UK campus students who already have greater cultural and linguistic competency in Asian studies and critical languages.
Future goals include implementing various travel opportunities and co-curricular programming made possible by recent grants and establishing a Chinese partnership through a Confucius Institute in central Kentucky. Potentially, the center could also create a Title VI Center, which would give a more permanent structure to funding for the education of teachers in the Asian languages.
Recent Asia Center successes include:
- a 2006 U.S. Department of Education award, entitled Undergraduate International Studies and Foreign Language Programs (UISFL) grant, for some $157,000, over a two-year period, to strengthen Asian studies and languages across the curriculum in support of an Asian concentration within the new International Studies major.
- two successful applications in 2007, including support from the Japan Foundation, for $180,000, to create a Japan Studies concentration within International Studies and to establish an active exchange program to benefit both our students who travel, and our domestic students who will attend a more international campus here in Kentucky. This grant, matched by UK funds, is designed to pave the way for UK to certify teachers of Japanese.
- renewed support from the Freeman Foundation in 2008, the organization that gave the Asia Center its first $1 million grant in 2002 under the Freeman Foundation Undergraduate Asian Studies Initiative. This recent award, in the amount of $300,000 over a two-year period, will allow the focus on China Studies to keep up with the Japan Studies initiatives.
- a number of smaller grants over the last 3 years- namely from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Japan Foundation’s Center for Global Partnership, and the Freeman Foundation’s National Consortium for Teaching about Asia for outreach programs with K-12 teachers.
Special thanks to:
- Current co-directors Keiko Tanaka (Sociology) and Bob Haven (Fine Arts)
- Past program directors and constant supporters Doug Slaymaker (MCL) and Beth Goldstein (Education)
- David Bettez of OIA and Jan Swauger of Development, and Asia Center Steering Committee members G.T. Lineberry, Becky Ryder, Srimati Basu, Buck Ryan and Mark Dressman
- The members of the Asia Center Advisory Board
- Asia Center Assistant Director Shana Herron
- Many other members of the UK family for their cooperation, support and commitment of funds.
Asia Center Co-Directors Keiko Tanaka, associate professor of Community and Leadership Development in the UK College of Agriculture, and Bob Haven, assistant professor of Theatre Studies