Fulbright orientation

We just completed three intensive days of orientation with the other Fulbrighters in Slovakia this year. This whirlwind of presentations, language training, and introductions was organized by Nora Hlozeková, who has been the Executive Director since the Velvet Divorce from the Czech Republic in 1993, and her very capable staff.

Professor Marta Botiková, Department of Ethnology, Comenius University, presented a fascinating overview of Slovakian cultural history in Central Europe. Seated at the table in front is Nora Hlozeková. (I'll try to get a better picture later.)

Mária Paniaková (right) is the Program and Student Advisor for the Fulbright Commission. Viera Zimová is the Finance Officer.

The most intensive part of the orientation was seven hours of Slovak language instruction, a few hours each day, presented by Maja Vrábelová. She is a very busy teacher of English providing training for the U.S. Embassy staff among others. She used to train Peace Corps volunteers coming to Slovakia, but the U.S. closed the Peace Corps program here after the fall of communism. (I confess I did not know that we had been sending Peace Corps volunteers to nations of the old Warsaw Pact.)

Most helpful to me was the work on pronunciation. I have been able to find words and phrases with my pocket dictionaries, but was clueless about how to say anything. One cannot hope to be remotely fluent in a matter of days or even months, but I now find myself practicing words with clerks and reading street signs to myself to get comfortable with pronunciations.

Other presentations were made by representatives of the U.S. Embassy, Larry Silverman, a career Foreign Services Officer who serves as Deputy Chief of the Mission, and Edward Kemp, the Public Affairs Officer. They stressed their support for developing higher education exchanges among students and faculty and projects they are pursing in addition to Fulbright programs.

Dr. Viera Farkasova, Head of the Unit of Higher Education Programs and Projects, Slovak Acadaemic Association for International Cooperation, gave us an overview of the shifts underway in Slovak higher education, especially to conform to the Bologna agreements that will make it easier for credits and degrees to be transferred within the European Union. We learned that about 50% of applicants to Slovak universities are accepted. But the nation is worried about the "brain drain" of the best and brightest who leave to work elsewhere in Europe or the U.S. where they can get much better salaries.

Most valuable of all was getting to know the other Fulbrighters and comparing notes on problem-solving as we all adjusted to our new home. We all have e-mail, so I am sure we will be in touch regularly this year.

Our final lunch together at the Hotel Dukla.

Here we shared dinner at the Downtown Restaurant in Old Town.

We also attended a marvelous opening reception for the art exhibit, "Dreams Intersect Reality," at the Palffy Palace in Old Town, and went on a lengthy guided sightseeing tour by bus and foot through Bratislava, which I talk about in other posts.

NOTE: Click any image in this blog to see it full-size.