Lions Club, Welcome Reception and African/African American-Chicano-Chicana Studies

Labor Day: The Week of 6 September started with Labor Day holiday on Monday - which a offered a welcome long week-end to rest and prepare for upcoming commitments.

Lions Club: On Tuesday I had the pleasure to attend the Denver Lions Club weekly meeting at Maggiano's Italian restaurant with Catherine Ostrander, who is Head of Community Relations at Auraria Library and a newly elected Lions Club board member. The Lions members were vey friendly and welcoming - they even have a special 'Welcome to the Denver Den' song which they sing to visitors. An enjoyable lunch, with particularly tasty lasagna! The invited speaker was Aaron Harber, a television host, producer, political and economic commentator and newspaper columnist.  His talk about “The impending November, 2010 elections” gave an interetsing inside view of the upcoming Senate and Governor election.  

Lunch with Fulbright Laura: Thursday was a big day! Lunch with Mary and Laura Maxwell, a Fulbright French Language teaching assistant who's currently working at a Denver high school and studying at Metro State College Denver. She's from Paris, but also has family in Newcastle upon Tyne, so we had plenty in common.

Fulbright Welcome Reception: Late Thursday afternoon was my official Fulbright Welcome Reception, held in the ELC, Auraria Library. This was a warm and enjoyable occassion. I felt privileged to meet senior adminsitrators and faculty members from all three of the sponsoring institutions (UCD, MSCD and CCD). UCD Provost Rod Nairn gave an introductory address and Dr Carolyn North, Assistant Vice Chancellor for International Affairs,outlined key aspects of my program. Delicious food and wine, flowers, photography and wonderful music played by a specially auditioned string quartet of MSCD students. (All beautifully taken care of by Catherine and Niraj f Auraria Library).

I was pleased to be able to publicly express my deep appreciation to representatives of the three institutions for sponsoring my Fulbright Scholar in Residence program, as follows:  

Thank you Dr Nairn for your kind welcoming remarks. And thank you to our other distinguished guests for attending this reception - it a pleasure and a privilege to meet you. I would particularly like to acknowledge Dr Mary Somerville, originator and coordinator of this program and also co-sponsors Dr Carolyn North and Dr Ali Thobhani for bringing this program from proposal to reality.

I would also like to acknowledge the strong support from my home university, Queensland University of Technology (QUT) – in particular Vice-Chancellor Professor Peter Coldrake, Executive Dean of Education Professor Wendy Patton and Head of School for Cultural and Language Studies in Education Professor Annette Patterson. In fact, thank you everyone! I deeply appreciate your association with my Fulbright program. This program resonates closely with the mission of the Australian-American Fulbright Commission, which is to promote understanding between the peoples of Australia and America through educational and cultural exchange. This program is opening up wonderful opportunities for me professionally and personally. I am proud to participate in this unique tri-institutional initiative which draws together colleagues from UCD, CCD and MSCD in furthering students’ academic success. I look forward to ongoing scholarly collaboration between our institutions, during and beyond the four months that I am in Denver.

African/African American-Chicano-Chicana Studies: On Friday, after teaching, I had lunch and a fascinating conversation, led by Dr Ali Thobhani, with colleagues specialising in African/African American-Chicano-Chicana Studies at Metro State College Denver. We covered a range of topics which helped me develop greater understanding of the learning experiences and needs of minority and ethnically diverse students in the Denver/US context.

Ipad: Another exciting event this week - I bought an ipad! Slim and sleek!

Over the week-end Mary and I went shopping and then worked on our respective writing and teaching projects.