Hello and welcome to Encompass Live this week. I am Christa Burns your host. This is Nebraska Library Commissions Weekly online event. Encompass Live we cover all sorts of NLC activities and library topics presented by NLC staff and some guest speakers we've been bringing in. These one-hour sessions are free and they were done every Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. central time. They are recorded so you can listen to them and watch them after the fact you can attend a live session. We do a mixture of things, presentations, interviews, book reviews, web tours, Q&A sessions, anything we can think of that might be of interest to the Nebraska Library community. And this morning we are going to do a session on accreditation and certification. Richard Miller and Laura Johnson will be going through that today. So I will go ahead and pass over on to them. I'm not sure who started. I'll start. Okay. I'll start. I'm going to begin. This is Richard Miller. Glad to see or hear you this morning. And I did want to give you a clue first of all about sometimes people confuse accreditation with certification. One of the ways that I've learned to remember that is that accreditation has to do with institutions or libraries and certification has to do with people. It's tipping. So we're going to talk about library accreditation, but then we're also going to talk about librarian certification and library board certification. So it's people for certification. It's institutions for accreditation. You can flip over a couple of slides. This is a slide that Laura found of a non-library library, but it certainly looks like a library and you can flip to the next one as well. So why do we have public library accreditation in our state? Well, you can see there and I'm not going to read the slide to you that it is meant to improve services. It started some time ago and it does give libraries to set up guidelines from which to do things. I'm going to read from the introduction to the guidelines for public library accreditation. Just several of the sentences there. It says in those guidelines in the introduction, Nebraskans deserve and expect high quality service from the public libraries. The purpose of statewide guidelines is to establish a consistent level of basic library and information service that can be expected to be available in every public library across the state. And later it says the topics addressed in our accreditation process include governance, service, and resources of public libraries. The anticipated outcome is that Nebraska citizens will have access to accurate, high quality library and information services from public libraries that meet statewide guidelines. And then a bit later in the guidelines under the purpose statement, there are a couple more sentences I'd like to read to you. It says the guidelines for accreditation should serve as a tool for measuring and encouraging growth and development of library and information services offered in Nebraska public libraries. The outcome should be the availability of those services for Nebraska citizens served by accredited libraries in the next slide. So why should libraries be accredited? Well, you can see there that there are a number of reasons for it. I'm going to start with the second one. You are eligible. Your library becomes eligible for state aid to public libraries. You're eligible to apply for three different grant programs that we have here at the commission, youth grants for excellence, continuing education grants and library improvement grants, which in the past were called LSTA grants. And you are eligible to apply for other federal grants, such as the community development block grants or the USDA grants and loans. Those last two that I mentioned here, a number of public libraries have received for their public library building programs. And quite honestly, a better reason probably for your library to be accredited is to demonstrate to local officials and to your customers that you have met a certain level of excellence in your community. Go to the next slide. In fact, go two slides. Now to be accredited, each year around mid-July, we send letters out to all unaccredited public libraries and to about a third of accredited public libraries that are up for reaccreditation. And the reason we do that is so that we don't have everybody coming up the same third year. We kind of split those up a bit. Accreditation itself runs a three-year period that goes October 1st through September 30th for that three-year period. I do have to warn you, however, that if during a three-year period, the commission learns of a situation of some substantial change in the library's situation that affects one or more of the guidelines or the level of accreditation, the commission can review and revoke or revise a library's accreditation standing or place a library on probation. It's accreditation on probation until that deficiency is rectified. Basically, what we're saying is that if you have a situation that changes significantly within that three-year period, the expectation is that you will maintain that level of accreditation, that phase of accreditation throughout those three years. If you can't do that, you should really let us know because we need to look at that in the next slide. Here's a slide of what the guidelines look like on the first page and Laura has put on these slides, the link, and Kristen has put these links in our delicious account at the commission so you can find them for this presentation after this presentation. You don't need to try to scribble those down at this point in the next slide. There are three different levels or phases of accreditation, depending on whom you speak to. There's an essential level, an enhanced level, and an excellent level. The essential level is the beginning level. We used to, under the old guidelines, had kind of a beginning and advanced. We had two levels, but now we have three levels. I think it provides for more opportunities for libraries. Under the essential level, there are 26 guidelines listed. In order to be accredited at the essential level, the public library has to meet all 26 of those guidelines. If the library wants to be at the enhanced level, it has to be all of the essential guidelines, those 26 plus 18 of the 22 guidelines listed under the enhanced level. And if the library wants to be at the excellent level, it has to meet all 26 on the essential level, all 22 of the enhanced level and 14 of the 16 at the at the excellent level in order to be accredited. State aid is awarded at higher levels for the enhanced level and for the excellent level of accreditation. So that's another good reason to work toward a more advanced accreditation. Each of the phases of levels of accreditation have the following groupings of guidelines. There's governance, funding and administration, services and facilities, personnel, collection, technology and public relations. There are some things that are required by the accreditation guidelines no matter what level library is and I'll just mention a few of them. It must have a certified library board and we'll be talking about certified library boards later in this presentation. It must have a mission statement. It must annually submit its statistics via this bibliostat collect or whatever other tool we happen to be using. It has to have a library telephone. It has to have paid library staff. It must have a certified director and it must offer free internet for its pay phones. Let's flip that over. Now, once the library is accredited or re-accredited, it does receive a certificate like the one you see here and that certificate is signed by a commission director Rod Wagner and you'll notice near the bottom of that certificate it indicates which level of accreditation the library has attained. That is good for three years and I don't think there's anything more to say about that but you can keep that up there. Before I finish, I want to stress the importance of as many libraries as possible submitting their annual statistics. We have public libraries that are unaccredited but which send in their statistics to us annually and do receive a $250 amount of money under dollars for data and that helps us with getting a more accurate picture of public libraries in our state and where they are statistically speaking. So I would like to encourage you to do that just to give you some idea and we're not going into detail on these accreditation guidelines but just to give you some idea about it in terms of the amount of local support either the total amount or the per capita support if the library is accredited at the essential level it has to meet a 65 percent of the average of other libraries within its size group in order to be accredited at the essential level and that shouldn't be difficult to do because really you're at the D level of your income so if a library says that it's difficult for them to meet that you can tell your local funding officials that you're at only 65 percent of the average level of other libraries within your size range. If the library wants to be at the enhanced level that library has to meet at least 85 percent of the average income of other public libraries within its size group and if the library wants to be at the excellent level that's when you're really exceeding other libraries because you have to be at 105 percent of other libraries within your size group in terms of local income or per capita income. And the last slide. We put these mug shots in here because we weren't sure if we'd be live. I assure you I don't always look so grim I sometimes smile um and uh that is the end unless you folks have questions about library accreditation before we move on to public library certification. Nobody has any questions I guess we'll move it off. All right. Nothing else? Yes please. We'll move it down there. Oh, down here. Yeah, yeah, down because of the feet. Now we'll talk about um librarian certification. Uh this is Christina.  So this was a good uh this this was a good uh picture for librarians I thought. Um goddesses as they are. Yes as we all know we are goddesses. Um librarian really helps us to assure good service to library users and that's the big thing. Um it gives librarians the opportunity to keep up and to learn. Um certification is not really a matter of earning the credential it's a matter of gaining the learning. Um it's meant to the program is meant to help you get the time to carve out the time to tell someone else yes I need to have this time to um go out and learn and um network with other people. So we really mean for it to be a help to you. Um it is a requirement for accreditation that you are certified. Um and at the various levels um you'll need more of your staff certified at the essential level you'll need your director certified but um as you go enhanced and excellent you need more people in your on your staff sort of right. Um um librarianship is really a learning profession we don't never stop learning um so many new things come along um we've just done the 23 things and I think everybody was so thrilled but there there were 23 things in six weeks that we all learned that were new so um we do have to keep up. Um the big deal with this program it is voluntary um and all you have to do is sign up it doesn't cost anything. Um the application form uh simply asks for your email address your mailing address and your level of education because there are levels of certification um what will happen is we'll send you a certificate we'll enter you into our database and we'll keep track of your um of the CE um credits that you've earned and we'll give you a password so you can check your record online anytime you want to. Um this is the uh application again and I suggest really that you go to the um front page of the Nebraska Library Commission's website and just search on library and certification application. When I did that this morning it came up the second thing in the list so you shouldn't have any trouble finding it. Um this is the certificate suitable for framing. They're good for three years and uh we love to we love to send them to people so um so how does all this really work? Well you go um you participate in activities and if an activity is sponsored by the Nebraska Library Commission or by a regional library system they will let us know who will attend it. They'll send us basically a copy of the signing sheet but if you um attend other workshops or you go to one of the web junction webinars or you um recordings of this I mean there's just lots of ways to earn credits um you need to let us know you've done it we have no way of knowing unless you let us know so we have put a um a form on the web again and if you go and search on CE activity report that should come up um and we just want to know um who you are what you attended when it was because we like to we like to enter things in the database an event we enter one time and then we enter all the people who attended that event so we need to know when the event was so that we get the event um but we need to know the particulars of it um we just need to know what the program was about how does it relate to your job um we're pretty broad minded about what relates to librarianship because it's a pretty broad field um I always tell people that your violin lessons and your tai chi won't count um but really um if you need to learn to use Excel spreadsheet because you use those in your job well then that that's a continuing education for you if you need um and I would think almost everyone would need um CPR that counts because we would really like you to save lives if you can so um and if you have a question about whether an activity would count it can be a call and I'll um we can go over the guidelines and see if we think it would um be suitable for um uh a CE activity um we need to know what time the what time the activity started and what time it ended because that's kind of how the number of um points that's determined and we need to let us know within 90 days uh we do find people who sometimes let it go and then they don't remember exactly when it was or who the speaker was or something and so it's just really better if you let us know right away so we're gonna ask that you do this within 90 days in fact we're gonna insist that you do it within 90 days um then you also you can check your record anytime online um you will have a password and you just go to the CE record review again something you can search on the nlc homepage and it will come up you just enter your name your password and you will see um what's on your record um passwords are combinations of letters numbers and symbols and they're case sensitive in other words they're awful to read over the telephone so if you uh have trouble with your password there is a password look up on this um and if you want us to help you with your password we'd be happy to but send us a little email um because we want to email it back to you so you can just cut and paste it into the box rather than having to read it aloud um we do keep your record confidential you of course are free to share it with anyone um and we recognize that your library your library board the people that run your library certainly have a vested interest in your continuing education your professional development but um this is your professional development so we won't share it with people um so how does all this really work exactly well you need to fulfill the basic skills requirements first when you first sign up um to be in the certification program you'll get what is essentially a um certificate for three years and during that first three year period you'll need unless you have already completed formal education in library science you will need to fulfill the basic skills requirements we do offer the basic skills classes which would fulfill those requirements but you can do it by taking courses at the community college or other college courses and then you need to participate in library related continuing education activities so that at the end of the three year period you have earned 45 continuing education credits that does seem like a lot until you think oh well that was three years that was only 15 a year and if I went to a couple of clip meetings and the summer reading program workshop that's it I've I've earned the cd credits so some people find that they have to be um very selective in what they attend because there are so many things out there to attend um then you need to unless the activity was sponsored by the Nebraska Library Commission or a regional system you need to report your attendance within 90 days um anytime you look at your record is there's something that you don't understand or if there's a problem with your attendance of something let us know just give me a call or give you know send me an email and let me know there's a problem if um at the end of the three year period or you you know that your renewal is coming up and you haven't earned your 45 key um credits well things happen sometimes and I appreciate that and if you need an extension because you broke your leg or you had to plan your daughter's wedding or you're taking your mother-in-law to chemotherapy you understand that um and we can give you a little bit more time on the other hand we will be quite as understanding if you didn't do it just because you didn't do it um but we would like to encourage you to keep up and to kind of pace yourself so that you don't have a lot of credits to earn at the end of a period um if however there's a problem let me know we'll work it out we'll figure out something so that you can earn the credit she needs and get your certification renewed renewal is automatic at the end of a three-year period uh if you have the 45 state e-credits we'll send you a new certificate and you're good for another three years um at the end of three years when you've gotten a new certificate we sort of set the clock back to zero and you have to earn 45 more credits in the next three-year period as well there are no fees there's never any charge for any of this um we talked a little about the basic skills requirements I just want to go through them really fast we need training in four areas really which is public service directly helping the public collection development which of course is helping the public but in a kind of an indirect way as you purchase materials for your library organization of materials which is uh how to catalog and make your materials accessible to the public again really public service but in an indirect way and public library administration which is all those things that you have to do um reporting your statistics and probably scraping the chewing gum off the sidewalk and a whole lot of things as well but those are the basic skills requirements and we do teach classes but there are other ways but you can get those useful skills requirements as well and that's it in a nutshell um if you do have questions please let us know um we're happy to talk with you about it and um we hope we'll see you at the workshops thanks a lot. Thank you. Anybody have any questions right now for Laura? How will we plan any time to ask other questions to do? Now in keeping with the gods and goddesses Laura put together a typical looking library board in Nebraska here just for your information I think actually these are greek gods and goddesses but I guess that's what boards have to aspire to anyway probably or these are all gods these aren't goddesses I don't see any goddesses on there I guess they're all gods and we'll go to the next one. This might be a more typical library board although they're cartoon characters but I did want to read you just a little bit from the public library board certification slide that that you'll see after this it does say the public library board certification program is deciding to help improve your library increase board involvement fulfill library accreditation requirements and organize continuing education activities for board members I think what you're seeing here is that both these accreditation and the types of certification that we're doing are all tied together with the accreditation guidelines with state aid with all the other things are kind of they all mesh together in some ways so why do we why do we then have library board certification in Nebraska I read you those sections already but why does the library community feel it should be a requirement of the accreditation guidelines well by law most of our library boards in our state are governing or administrative boards and even though in first class cities first class cities have the option of having advisory boards most of our first class cities have governing or administrative boards so it's very important that they be knowledgeable about what it is they need to be doing and that's why we have library board certification now Laura said that getting 45 hours of CE within three years is really pretty easy for boards we just require that they get 20 hours of CE within three years so that should be really easy and yet we do have situations where boards do say that they have difficulty you can flip over the next one have difficulty earning those and we're going to give you some ideas here in the next one as well we're going to give you some idea of how you could earn some of those hours how your board could earn some of those hours they could attend workshops they could view library related videotapes in fact we just updated our list of videotapes that is of use to librarians and library board members and in fact unlike light public librarian certification in which they can only get 10 of their 45 hours using videos library boards could do all 20 of their hours using the videos if they chose to but beyond that we have other ways that they might do it they can discuss questions that appear at the end of the library board manual which all of you have in your library there are questions at the end of each chapter also at the end of each chapter there's an evaluation that you can do and each library board member that sends in an evaluation sheet if they do it very well just don't put down yes and no but to actually give us some feedback you can get one half hour of certification credit for that other ways that they can get certification credit are that they can in fact this is this is one example that I that I see from a library in our state every library board meeting the library board director brings four articles from library related journals and they discuss each of those articles for some period of time now one of the things that you have to realize also is that any one board member could earn all 20 of those hours if he or she wished to but it makes more sense for the board to do things together because you really double up on things let's suppose that the board has a half hour discussion about some topic related to the future of the library or some such thing well within that half hour they can get 30 minutes times five credit for their certification it's really easy to add up these hours so I don't think there's a really good excuse for a board not to be able to get there 20 hours within a three year period and move to the next slide so if your board is not currently certified you can go to our online application process and it's picture here for you on the commission website and apply we'll ask you to provide as you see their up-to-date information and accurate information about who your current board members are or whose board member names we should drop and there's a link on that page also to figure out what it is that we have currently listed on our on our list of your board members in the next slide once your board is signed up you can submit your CME credits to the commission electronically now please give us as much detail as possible I'll just reiterate what Laura said when she was talking about the details give us the title or the name of the event or the article that you read or the activity that you did make sure that you include the date include how many hours or CEUs that you engaged in this activity how many board members participated you don't necessarily have to list the board members names because we will have those just tell us how many of your board were there if there are only four board members at that meeting at which you discussed it then indicate that and please send in that information as close as possible to the event itself the the difficulty with waiting too long is that you forget and we don't know actually what happened and when it occurred and trying to piece that together after the fact it's very difficult there is a statement in here somewhere that says well you good way till the end of the three years to send it in but please don't do that use the 90 day rule that Laura was talking about this will help everybody in fact send it in just the next day and then you'll really remember what the story is once your board has completed its 20 CEUs it will receive a certificate i don't believe we have a picture of the certificate but it looks very much like the other certificates that you saw indicating that it was certified for those boards that are already certified they will automatically receive their new certification at the end of the three-year period of their certification if they have completed at least their 20 CEUs for that period and reported that to the commission now we might like to do this but we can't really allow for extra hours to be carried over to the next certification period there's really no way to record that or keep a record and it really does defeat the purpose of the library board keeping up with what's going on for you keep that here uh yeah go back thanks um we have a link on their website and there it is there and as as we said earlier these links are in our delicious accounts you can find those later on but you can check the status of your library or any other library as far as their certification goes on the commission's website the expiration date you'll notice is listed there on on the website and so you can check your board certification or anybody else's for that matter and the last slide finally we wanted to show you a picture of Lynda Janssen who is our staff assistant within library development because she actually is the one that you'll most often talk to about board certification you will be sent when you send in your online board certification i receive it and she receives it but she is the one who records the hours that are sent in um let's keep Lynda smiling as she is in this picture by sending in your info on board ce use in enough detail so that you can figure out what you're talking about and sending it in very close to the event itself thank you very much i've got a few more facts and figures i brought along in case you didn't ask any questions i was going to answer some questions for you but let's give you an opportunity to ask some questions of laura for me before we move on to that so does anybody have any questions about the um library librarian or board uh certifications and accreditation you can either um you can either use your microphone if you want to or use the text chat um jennett says in the text chat how do you get to the commission slide share and delicious account okay and a great picture of Lynda i'm sure we'll be happy to do that i noticed she said it was a great picture of Lynda but she didn't mention the one of richard did she that was pretty grim pretty grim um are the powerpoint slide share and delicious accounts are will be on the recording when this is put up you can also find information links to them if you just search the commission's website um on slide share or delicious we have a whole web page of all the different things that commission is doing 2.0 type stuff like this for sharing they're both on there but the specific link for the slide share and the delicious will be um on the recording when it is posted up on the website too anybody have any questions go right ahead we'll wait for you to type if you're trying to type something into the chat or if you want to use your microphone you can go ahead and do that as well and i see you have a question i think you're going to use the text chat don't forget if you do have a microphone just hold down your control key while you're speaking and it will uh broadcast to everyone okay can you hear me this is Karen okay am i too loud i don't i my sound was real low yesterday um the basic skills program once do you ever repeat that again like can staff use come to those sessions as a refresher for c credit they certainly can if they want to um in fact if you haven't done it in 15 or 20 years it's probably a great idea um i think we probably need to work on a basic skills refresher course for people too okay thank you anybody else have any questions you either click on the text chat button to get that open or hold down your control key to use your microphone try to throw my factoids out he stunned you into so you tell them everything they needed to know go ahead maybe put them asleep here are a couple of facts for you of the 277 of them are accredited so there's work to be done out there folks let's get those other unaccredited public libraries accredited and i wanted to uh just uh tell you again about the due date to submit your annual statistics the accredited or unaccredited your library to get those statistics into us if you're unaccredited you can earn that $250 for dollars for data if you are accredited if you're at a higher level you can both get your state aid of course state asian and uh i brought along the state aid formula in case you'd like to know how we figure state aid we should be getting the state aid out in the next several weeks we are behind i will take almost full blame your state in the near future for those of you who are interested in state aid for libraries in populations of under 8 000 the formula is six hundred and twenty five dollars plus 10 cents per capita and for library apita we also pay a one percent incentive for those libraries that receive other public funding let's say from the county we pay one percent of that as an incentive and uh we may have to state aid for all of our public libraries so really how much and how we push the formula around or how we push the incentives around may be affected by by that this time for example under that are currently unaccredited because they didn't meet what's called the maintenance of effort which means that they have not come up with local funding that is higher than the lowest of the three previous fiscal three previous community is lower than the lowest of the three fiscal three previous fiscal years uh we can receive a waiver if everybody in town was cut the same amount but if the library was cut more than you know foldable for state aid so we will be in contact with those 12 public libraries as well that's the end of the factoids i brought along in case there are any questions on those i'd be happy to try to answer them um we have a request from the text chat that i like to um uh what am i trying to say i i call it BASC BASK because otherwise we could call it BS and all that um yes our the basic skills class uh we're going to be offering this spring is um public service that covers basic customer service reference leaders advisory programming and outreach it will be held in six places around the state um so if i can remember them all seward bretna north fork carney north platt and alliance um though it'll be different times um different dates but it's pretty much all in april and like first week of may oh except for the online class we also have the online class and that will run from april 15th to june 17th i think um registration opens today so you just go to the library training calendar um the brasska library commission website and sign up um and we'll be happy to see you there if you have any questions just let me know can i convenient that i open today you do yeah oh karin you have another question yes i have a question about the statistical report i thought the due date was march 31st that's i think you're probably wrong i think i messed that up oh i'm so glad we just double check it is march 31st i had it in my notes but didn't read it correctly sorry oh thank you i can stop having heart failure before you from stupidity sorry uh deb you have a question as well go ahead i do thank you christa uh richard um concerning uh the statistical reports how is there a way that we can be certain that our report has been received for which report that is for our statistical reports john felton is the one who heads that up he's not here but i will ask him that question and we'll pass that word on to you okay i appreciate it thank you let you know who was that camera um yeah that was deb finnard deb finnard okay yeah okay anything else any other questions oh apparently john is in our other room here the commission he says you can email him if you want to know as well anyone else is curious about what's going on john felton here at the commission if you've got his email that would be j f e l d on at mlc dot s e a t e dot n e dot u s wow you're brown i've said that a couple times if she can give us all the words to misty she can give us that right any other questions anybody has about any of the certification and creditations that we talked about this morning no looks like everybody's pretty quiet all right anything else you guys need to have up with all right if nobody has any questions now that's fine we can wrap it up for today you do have the contact information from these slides for uh richard and laura and linda so feel free to contact any of them when if you do have any further questions anything that didn't get answered or mentioned here today session has been recorded so we will um have that up and out to you probably this afternoon oh we're getting some applause thank you very much thank you for attending this morning we hope it was helpful and hope you'll join us next week when we will be learning about the new nebraska access website that just went live thank you thank you very much you should have a bow button thank you very much bye


Hi guys, this is rich from risk to be live Astralis Capital Inc. Ordinary shares a USA is on fire today up 8.57% traded half a million shares every single time this stock goes under a dollar It's a buy we literally see it go under a dollar Goes to 92 cents jumps to 104 Goes to 95 cents jumps to 99 goes to 95 cents jumps to 132 huge jump there goes down to one jumps back up to 108 goes down to 98 Jumps back to 118. Have you seen this trend? We just recently saw it go to 90 cents. It's now today at a dollar 14 Will this trend continue? I'm not sure. I believe if you see it go back under a dollar That's the time to buy if you see it go up above a dollar ten or higher That's when you got to have your finger on the trigger and you've got to be thinking about sell But you never know it might keep going. We are definitely finding a bottom in the cannabis sector and This trend may continue However, overall What we've seen with Astralis is that under a dollar? It's a buy and then over a dollar ten a dollar twenty dollar thirty range is a sell and then you just rinse and repeat That's been how we've been successful with our members on Astralis Capital Okay, thank you very much If you like this video smash the like button share this video everywhere if I win and you win We all win Astralis Capital a USA in Canada. Let's take a look at the American symbol A US CF in America. Let's take a look real quick in America and see where they're at So no detailed quote on a US a US CF Let's go to bar chart a US AF A US AF This is the American symbol a US AF up 6.64% at 85 cents and you can see they actually have a buy rating on bar chart and It's we go look at Astralis Capital a Canadian symbol a 48% buy on bar chart So like I said every time it goes under a dollar it seems to be a buy it bounces up and then you sell it So you may want to rinse and repeat Do you do diligence do your research love to know what you think about Astralis Capital? It's on fire right now. Will this continue? Let me know what you think comment down below Share the video everywhere your boy rich from wish to be live and I'm out peace


Hi there, I'm Sandy Olnok, artist and paper crafter here on YouTube, and today we're going to color Frenjpani flowerlets in Copic marker. And I have had these plants, I have never had any idea what they were called, but now I know I am educated and I'm going to be coloring these with the no line coloring method using a very light color ink. You can use any light color ink, dye inks work best for this because then you don't have to sit and wait for them to dry, which you would have to do with pigment inks. And pigment inks sometimes even afterward they can do a little bit of bleeding. So try it with the lightest kind of dye ink that you have. And I looked the flowers up to see there's so many different color ranges of them, but I'm going to do the ones that are yellow on the inside and they're white out at the edges of each of the flowers. But as we've talked about before here on YouTube, that white is only white when it's in comparison to something else. And an icy kind of blue or blue-green like this will give you that feeling of white even though we've got white paper and that sort of thing. There's nothing behind it that's going to make it look white. So that color sometimes can carry that whiteness with it. And as we get further along, you'll see how that kind of plays in. Now you need to make sure that the blue-green or if you use a blue, don't let it go too far into the yellow or else you're going to end up with green in your flowers. Now I did it first with a very light yellow because I knew I was going to do a stronger color. On the flowers themselves, there's a lighter line down the center of each one of the petals and then they kind of have just these little flicks. They don't have blended edges. They have really sharp edges on them. So if you zoom in on a photograph on Google or something, you'll see exactly how those flowers are constructed depending on which colors you're choosing to copy. To color your friend, Jopani. And by the way, I'm glad there's a video on YouTube that tells me how to pronounce front Jopani, which is what the lady says in the video. So if you don't know how to pronounce something, look it up on YouTube. So here we have the centers of the flowers all done. And then in the very middle of each one is a very dark orange spot. The branch that they're on, since it's not stamped all the way out to the edge and I'm using the no-line look, I can make the branch go all the way out to the edge. And what I noticed in photos was that there's brown and green in the stems that go out to the flowerlets. They might get heavier into the brown further on into the plant. But as they get out to these edges, they're going to be more of a green. So I tested on a piece of scrap to try to find the right green. And I thought this YG63 would do a pretty decent job. I realized I had forgotten my little buds, put a little bit of yellow in those and then let a little of the green carry into the buds because the buds, you know, they still have some green in them because they're not open yet. And then I'm going to layer some browns on top of the green. And that's going to give them that natural look that looks like the real frangipani plant. And so it's going to give us also some contrast. Notice how as I'm adding more contrast to the branch, we're getting more of that feeling. Those flowers are white. They're they're getting lighter because of the contrast with the darker brown and green colors. Not even a little darker color here with the E57. So now I want to add something else that's going to give me a little more contrast, because there's not enough here for me. And I want to have contrast behind at least one of the flowers. And so I used a darker color than I'd recommend, just so you'd be able to see it, use the very, very palest kind of a green or blue that you have to draw yourself a rough outline of a leaf and you can look at the leaves on Google. But they're just a very plain kind of leaf. They have a a vein down the middle and veins that go out to the outside edges. And I'm just going to put a few of them on one side to try to create some contrast, because the white is going to appear stronger white because of contrast with other parts of the picture. And when you're doing it just in Copic marker, rather than drawing it in pencil, you can adjust like this. So I'm going to add another leaf up here on the top, fattened up the leaf down on the bottom and can kind of play around with exactly what shape and how large I want them to be or do I want to add more because I've got that freedom since I'm just doing it in Copic marker. Now, the leaves I noticed in the pictures that I was looking at one half of the leaf was darker and had really distinct veins. So I'm going to add those distinct veins on half of each one of the leaves, not stressing out about light source or anything. Just wanted to make sure it felt like the leaf that belongs to this plant and giving these these lines this way. Now, if your lines are looking like mine, they're looking a little garish. Everything else is looking all soft and delicate. I do have a solution for you. So hang tight. And it's something that I've done a lot before in different different occasions, as well as in the Copic jumpstart class. So if you have taken that, then you'll know they just go over top of something and you can often smooth out some of those rough edges. So I'm going to just go over them with the lighter color and then add a little bit more into the other half of the leaf as well. And just by adding a couple of leaves to the image, look how much more finished it looks and the flowers have much more of a finished look to them as well. The panel I popped up onto some dimensional adhesive and I use the same yellows to create a little lip of color underneath on the card base. So I'd pull a little more of that yellow color into the card. So I hope you enjoyed this video. I hope you learned something from it. There are links in the doobly-doo for lots of different things that you might be interested in, like supplies and the Copic jumpstart class. And I hope to see you in another video in the very near future. Have an awesome day. Go make something beautiful.


So, hi everybody, my name is Amelia Vanderlaan and I am a US foreign service officer, I am on my third tour. And I feel tremendously lucky that my job is literally to help do outreach around study abroad, diversifying what study abroad looks like where students go. And most importantly, connecting undergraduates and graduate students all across the US with really neat opportunities. For me, I started my State Department career as an intern over 12 years ago, and I did a lot of these State Department exchange programs and they're what led me into the Foreign Service gave me a bite of what was to come in all of the things that I've been doing. And so today what we're going to do is we're going to talk through some of the main program opportunities that are available to you, whether you are currently an undergrad, whether you're a grad student or sort of somewhere in between. But I obviously can't do this alone so I'm actually joined today by my two absolutely fantastic interns who have both successfully studied abroad both gotten great State Department internships and things like that. And we're actually in a better position to tell you how to springboard into the State Department than I am being about 12 years out in terms of the entry stuff. So with that, I'm going to turn it over to Jada to introduce herself, and we'll get this ball rolling. Jada. Hello, everyone, my name is Jada Tanner and I am a junior at George Washington University in Washington DC, majoring in international affairs with the concentration in global public health. And I am also a critical language scholarship alumna for Guangzhou, South Korea for the 2019 cohort, and I am currently a State Department intern in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Thank you. Thanks so much, Jada. And now I'm going to turn it over to our other intern, Markel Kelly. Markel, do you want to give us a short introduction on yourself and what you do. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Markel Kelly. I'm a sophomore international studies major in Portuguese major at Morehouse College. And I'm currently a VSFS intern at the State Department to the ECA study abroad department. And I'm also a yes abroad alumni. Perfect. Thanks so much, guys. So for everybody's awareness sort of on this webinar and call within the State Department, we have an entire Bureau that is simply dedicated to education and cultural affairs. We sort of talk about ourselves as the people movers of the State Department. So in non COVID times, we're generally sending 55,000 people across the globe every single year. And so a lot of the times this is international students coming to the US or people on professional programs, but we actually fund and send 15,000 Americans overseas every single year. We work every year with at least 101 US public and private institutions, but actually it's thousands of institutions across the country. And basically what we're looking to do is to strengthen our relationships with other countries. The way that we do this is on the ground people to people connections so it's folks getting on planes or getting into zoom to sort of make those real last three feet connections. So, in terms of options that kind of exist for you. When you think about study abroad think about study abroad much more as diplomacy and like sort of how you are interacting with this way bigger universe of what's going on. So within our office we actually have two major scholarship programs that kind of help anchor this mobility across the continents. So we have the critical language scholarship program which allows for students to study one of 15 critical needs languages. And we also offer the Gilman scholarship program where students get to pick their study abroad location, and go on short term or long term programs to sort of do programs of their choice. We view study abroad as kind of helping give students the skills they need to be future leaders like these are applicable whether you are a STEM major, whether you are majoring in political science or all of these sort of develop cross cultural competencies and language skills that are going to help you get jobs but also have a really amazing experience making friends overseas. So we always look to our study abroad students the 330,000 of them generally annually has real representatives of the US. So our small office is basically dedicated to helping give Americans resources to get overseas, learning about safety and security, and also finding funding because study abroad can be expensive. So with that will sort of dive into the critical language scholarship program which is one of our main flagship programs. So the way this program works is basically it's a fully funded summer program you do not pay for anything from visa to flight to your home state, everything is covered by the federal government, and it's open to US college and university students either in undergrad or graduate school, who want to learn a less commonly taught language. We are basically designed to pack an entire year's worth of language study into like eight to 10 weeks. And we offer scholarships and the following languages everything from Azerbaijan and Bangladesh to Hindi to Indonesian Persian Punjabi Swahili Turkish and Urdu. So those are all entry level you do not have to have taken a single day of those classes to qualify for critical language scholarship so if you are excited about the prospect of learning a brand new language, you can always apply at those entry levels. We also offer intermediate and advanced study in Arabic, Korean, Russian and Portuguese, as well as Chinese and Japanese. Now, if you're looking at our languages, some have prerequisites where you've had to have studied this a little bit in college, other do not. In terms of our cohorts, we're really proud that they are diverse groups of students. We generally select 550 individuals from all across the US, all 50 states. And about 40% of our CLS students identify as people of color and 24% of students are Pell Grant recipients. And we work with all sorts of institutions. So, so long as you are enrolled as an undergraduate or graduate student, you are good to go. In terms of the application launches, they'll be opening up fall 2021. Usually we launch around in September. And applications are always do mid November. So you can apply by going on to the CLS scholarship.org website, and we always do individualized webinars and any of the languages so say you really want to study or do you. You'll get to talk with past CLS alumni on what that experience was like. But I of course am not an actual participant of CLS and so I'm going to turn it over to Jada to kind of talk about what the program was actually like as a student perspective. Anything else she has to sort of say about what CLS was like for her so Jada, can I turn it over to you. Yes, thank you Amelia so thanks to CLS I was able to study at Chonam University for eight weeks, which is in Gwangju, South Korea. I was very nervous when I was applying because I had only taken about a year's worth of Korean. So I was a beginner, very much so a beginner in Korean, the only thing I was sure that I could do was probably order at a restaurant and they could slightly understand what I wanted. And I was also very nervous because I was going to be staying with a home, a homestay family. Luckily for me my homestay mother was very sweet she had had many study abroad students before. And this was nothing new to her. And of course when we first met it was a lot of pointing and using translation apps so we could understand each other. But it definitely wasn't as nerve wracking as I thought it was going to be. And one thing that I really loved about CLS was that I was able to explore Korea, along with my cohort every week we went on a trip to somewhere, either within Gwangju or in another part of Korea. But I was also able to travel with my friends on different weekends we plan trips on our own which really attested to how my language ability had improved. Because I was booking trips on my own I was calling people trying to book trips, and I was also able to travel with my language partner, which was a student who also attended the local university, who we met once a week and we talked about anything and everything and was also able to travel with me as well. And I think the one thing that was difficult at times was definitely a unique experience was that I was one of the only one of the few black women in my cohort. And so for many of the people that I was encountering specifically in Gwangju because it isn't a huge city it's the city of Korea and that's very small because Korea is a small country itself. So for many people they would just come up to me on the street and ask me questions because they had never met a black woman before and I guess I gave off a very American vibe so they never met a black American before. And I think at first it was a bit, it was a bit scary I mean, I didn't know the language and so I was confused on what they were asking me but it gave me a great opportunity to sort of have those tough conversations about race in America, or about my hair or just any questions they had they were never filled with malice they were just very curious about me and that was a great experience to have and I was able to provide a unique perspective. Students from the university would invite me to their club meetings because they were like they want to hear about your perspective on this like I was invited to English club and hip hop club like just because they knew that I might have an opinion on it. And I think when at when I left Korea I did not realize how much my career had improved until I reflected back on all my photos and the things that I had done and the places that I had gone. And I realized that I come to Korea only really knowing how to order food and I left with the ability to make solo travel plans and really get around Korea on my own if I needed to. And I think something that a lot of people take from CLS that you don't realize is that you learn what it means to represent your country abroad. Like we weren't going there just to frolic around Korea even though I think there was a lot of frolicking around Korea, but we also realized that we were representing our country and then for me I was representing sort of the image they would have a black people that they met in the future and I was very conscious of that. And I think I was very happy that I was able to get that experience. And just to wrap up just one of my favorite I think and most just bizarre experiences that I had in Korea so when I was there was the World Aquatics championship. And which is a competition I never heard of before but maybe if you're into swimming you've heard of it before. And our host university gave us tickets and we were on the bus on the way to the stadium and there was also another woman on the bus who was very obviously not Korean and she was lost and she didn't know where to go. And so we helped translate for her to the bus driver in Korean about where she needed to go and she was one of the Grecian swimmers representing Greece obviously. And so when we got off the bus she was very happy and she's like you guys speak Korean so well thank you for this. And she took a picture with us and we cheered her on during her event while also cheering on Team USA and the Korean team. So thank you. And apply for CLS. Awesome Jada. Thank you so so much. Okay so from CLS we're going to dive into the Gilman program which is another flagship State Department program that we have. Now the thing with Gilman is it's a little bit different than CLS in the sense that you as a student are choosing the program that you go on. So the way Gilman works is it's for undergraduates to study or intern abroad. You can get scholarships up to $5,000 and an additional $3,000 if you're studying a critical needs language. You have to be a Pell Grant recipient. And for your program, if you are at a four year institution it has to be at least three weeks. And students only to level one and level two programs and it has to be credit bearing. So you can do an internship overseas. You can do a year long program. But you're selecting what study abroad program you're going through so you could do something faculty led you could apply for a third party program but there's a lot of versatility within it. So we have a brand new second program that we sort of launched a year and a half ago called the Gilman McCain Scholarship. It's under the Gilman umbrella. The only real difference in terms of the programs is that it provides funding to students whose parents are active duty military. So if any of you guys have active duty parents, you can be on any type of financial aid to apply so if you're a student or if you are getting Pell Grants it doesn't matter. And we generally do our application cycle twice a year applications are currently open and we just extended an extra week because we know whether has been crazy for just about everybody in the country so our applications are due on March 9, but you can be looking ahead so we're basically allowing students to apply for academic year 2021 and 22 spring 2022 programs as well as things in spring and fall. And we really have been trying to be as flexible as humanly possible within our programs for what we're allowing at this time. So this is the Gilman program. One of the really wonderful things about it as a student is you've got pretty good odds of winning a Gilman recipient to applicant ratio is about one to four. And students come from all sorts of different institutions. We have about 33,000 alumni to date since we launched the program back in 2001, and students have gone to 151 countries. 47% of students were first generation college students 70% self identify as racial or ethnic minority. And we've worked with 13,000 1300 US institutions across the US to send students overseas so we definitely definitely recommend you apply if you're Pell Grant recipient. Great opportunity. Now, um, one of the things to sort of get you excited about study brought itself. I wanted to make sure to kind of turn things over to Markel because he is one of our future Gilmans. He has been caught up in the loop of sort of deferred things due to COVID, but he also has done a lot of our programs in ECA that are geared more for high school students as well. So as a kind of vanguard of somebody who is at the forefront of study broad and literally studying abroad right now in Panama. So I wanted to turn it over to Markel to kind of talk about study broad writ large the experiences he's had, and he can tell you a little bit about his ambitions to at some point use his Gilman scholarship overseas. So Markel, can I turn the mic over to you. Um, so yes, I, as I said earlier, I'm a kitty Largo Youth Exchange alumni, and the program provides about 60 scholarships for students to go abroad, high school students to go abroad, and highly Muslim populated countries. I was awarded to go to Sofia, Bulgaria, and a part of the program you get to stay at a study at a whole school in a with a host family. And I studied at awesome nice I'm so to each of this dead William Gladstone and the center of Sophia for the 2018 academic year. Also live with the host family. Interesting enough, while at my whole school. My first experience and I got there of course I was very nervous on this is my first time in Europe first time in Eastern Europe and the first time into a country that I have never heard of. So, um, being there it was, was particularly maybe feel very uncomfortable and beginning, but as time went along, it was very interesting to meet with different students at my whole school. And it helped me out. It really helped me to really immerse myself in the culture and also live with the host family. And I was able to fully immersion the culture in regards to learn about different culture should traditions. Sorry, and different things for instance, during November and December. In America I'm used to celebrate Thanksgiving my great grandmother, my, my mom and everything and we cook dishes cakes and a whole bunch of things. This is the first time of for me being away from my family. So, I decided to make these dishes that my great grandmother taught me from my host on host class amazing awesome my host family was an amazing experience, because they do not celebrate Thanksgiving as that is American tradition. So that was a part of a good part of culture change in their December Christmas which is also a big holiday for mostly everyone. My host mom took me to a remote village in northern Bulgaria, where I got to view my 98 year old host grandma. And I got to experience at 12 a.m. on Christmas Eve of these men coming in different types of clothing on and singing of hearing him to bring in the Christmas day. So definitely study abroad really opens your eyes to different things on that you may have never known. I also was able to take intense hearing classes twice a week with my Bulgarian teacher, as a part of the program. So I also started the first club at my own, my host high school. I mean Bulgaria they don't really have a high school since really don't volunteer and they really don't have clubs at the high school. Instead they, when you go to when you transfer from middle school to high school. They'll allow you to choose your career path right in a three. So I was at language school. So they didn't really have any clubs, but there was a group of students who love to speak English.  Later on they tell me I was just saying hi because I want to know if I could speak good English. So, once I found this out, I met with some of the English teachers shout out to Svetlana Stauncheva. And we started a Bulgarian English speech and debate team, which is a program that's actually through the Fulbright Commission in the area that they fund. I was able to take these students to a competition around the country, and they competed both locally and nationally, many of them made it on. And I've got to be many of their parents, which was also amazing experience because many of their parents have never seen in African American. So I remember one time me having a informational for this field trip, and a parent coming to me I was like, Hey, I just, I just wanted to talk to you, you know, I never really seen African American only a movies and I just want to say that the stereotypes that people may say they're not true, because I met you, which is amazing thing for me because I felt that as if the weight of my race was on my back while in Bulgaria. Also during February Black History Month, I was able to travel travel around Bulgaria and give presentations to different high school students about the African American experience. And also different aspects of Black History Month, and things of that sort and students were able to really look at not only, you know, American history but also look at their country and their experiences with the Roman community which is a group in Bulgaria that is often oppressed and have many different circumstances that could relate to the African American experience. Also while there, I was able to meet with some full bright alumni and some Peace Corps alumni, which are things I hope to apply to, to really get that full fellowship feel. And that was an amazing experience because they gave, they said, Well, it's amazing. I was, I remember studying abroad in Bulgaria for the first time and now I live in Bulgaria.  And I just made a lot of amazing memories that I will cherish on for the rest of my life. Awesome. I guess I'll go over as Amelia mentioned me being in Panama, which is interesting. I know we all know how COVID-19 has forced all of us to change our plans and shift things around, but I was supposed to be in Portugal, as I am a Portuguese major this semester studying Portuguese with the Gilman Scholarship that I was awarded. And unfortunately, my program was canceled, but I was able to shift my plans and kind of create my own culture immersion and study abroad experience here in Panama. So I am currently in Panama, meeting with locals and really practice on my span as you got studied before years in high school, which is also very close to the Portuguese. So I just encourage all of you to take advantage of these scholarships and fellowships that the State Department holds. Thanks so much, Markel. And I think we're all a little jealous you're as close to a beach as you are because it's a little cold in DC. So sort of to follow on, and it's something Markel kind of alluded to there is an entire fellowships bandwagon of basically financial resources that the federal government has that you can apply for that will make your life really fantastic and give you opportunities to present your country or just gain new skills. So a few opportunities to flag that I just absolutely love. One is the born fellowships and scholarships. These provide funding to us undergrads and graduate students to study languages and regions critical to our national security. So what's really great about these programs is, if you want to get into federal service, they actually have a one year requirement that you do federal government service afterwards and they do a whole host of career fairs, etc for borons. So if your dream is to work for the State Department Peace Corps USA ID anything along those lines. This can be a great way to get skills overseas, but also get your foot in the door. So one of the programs that I absolutely love is the Fulbright US student program so basically in non COVID times. We generally send American citizens to 140 countries to do either brand new research projects of their own devising over a nine month period, or to teach English overseas. And this can be at the elementary middle school high school or university level. These programs are absolutely fantastic in light of COVID. I mean we're really looking at country by country cases. But on every single campus you have somebody who is a fellowship program advisor who literally their job is to like help you get fellowships that's why they're paid. And so they'll look at your essays and help you find opportunities so I guarantee you have one on your campus. And so this is a great thing to do right after your senior year of college, but we don't discriminate against people who take a few years off between. So for example, I did my full bright in Turkey, a year after I had graduated. And so it's definitely something nice to be on the horizon. So a great opportunity or sort of aggregate place of opportunities is languages dot state dot gov. This is a one stop resource of all the federal government's funding towards language programs period so it combines not only what the Department of State is doing but also DoD the Department of Education, the NSA, you name it. And it looks at programs across whether you're in high school, a college student, a graduate student or professional, and by length and by country so if you're trying to figure out like hey how can I get funding to go learn some Urdu. It will help aggregate all of those results. And so that can be a great resource for you. The other real springboards I see as ways into the department are looking at some of our state state department student programs. So if you visit careers dot state dot gov. There's an entire section dedicated just to students it's interns hyphen fellows, you'll see it as a giant tab, it says interns and fellows, click on it. There are tons of programs that you can apply to. We do year round internships, not only in Washington DC and at our embassies overseas in COVID times, those are virtual. But we also have a virtual student federal service internship program as well and that works with 50 US federal agencies. So whether we're talking NASA or DoD or state department to do year long projects where you sort of work five to 10 hours a week so if you really think hey I'd like to work for the FBI. You can do a low stakes internship for a few hours a week to sort of get your feet wet with it. We also have some really amazing fellowship programs within the Department of State and sort of pro tip a lot of the students who go on to win these fellowships did Gilman they did CLS. And so these are good sort of springboards into the fellowships world. So the Charles B. Rangel International Affairs Program basically usually funds two years of graduate school and as a pathway to become a Foreign Service Officer as well. The same is true for the Pickering Foreign Affairs Fellowship. The primary difference between these two programs is in one you do internships with Congress on the Hill, as well as the State Department and with Pickering, you basically do an internship in Washington DC and one at our embassies overseas. There's a really neat summer program for the Rangel. That's really great if you're an undergrad that's a eight to 10 week program that's hosted at Howard University you can apply for. I think the deadline is actually it's always in February so if you're just starting off your undergrad career and you're not sure you want to commit to full on Foreign Service. It's a great way to get your feet wet in DC. And for all you IT folks out there. We also do have the Foreign Affairs IT Fellowship, which is for students who are interested in IT fields but it will pay for a master's in IT fields, and you become a Foreign Service specialist, and you have a five year commitment to the State Department. But I feel like I have been on a soapbox for a while so I'm going to turn it back over to Jada and Markel to offer their tips and tricks for applications and then we're going to triage your questions as best we can. And one last clarifying thing because it came in in the chat on Gilman, you must be a Pell Grant recipient if you're applying for the general Gilman if you're applying for Gilman McCain and your parents are active duty. You don't have the Pell Grant requirement so I just wanted to clarify that but with that I will turn it over to Markel and Jada to give you their tips and tricks. Markel, I guess I'll start off with the first tip. So start your applications early, but I'm also the same person who's a person that gets the application in like at the last hour. But no matter what, still get your application in. And because I guess I think the readers of the application they'll look mostly at the content of the application now when you turn it. And another great tip is to talk to your campus fellowships advisor they are being paid to help you apply to these fellowships and hopefully get into these fellowships. So they're a great resource to use, you can't lose anything from talking to them. Great people to have read your essays or ask any essay questions. If you don't know who to ask. So schedule meeting with your recommenders and give them all the materials beforehand. I'm usually for most of these fellowships and scholarships recommenders have a different deadline. But if you send them your resume your state of the purpose and tell them your passion and why you really want to get discussion fellowship, those recommenders will really appreciate that and I feel like they'll write the best recommendations. It's also important to do your research on the program and really understand it a lot of people who apply to fellowships you're most likely applying to many different fellowships at the same time. And it does read if you're sort of using the same statement of purpose for all of them, and it sort of connects back to understanding what you're applying for know what the program wants for you and make sure that reads through your application. And also, when you're applying for anything that is through the government or the State Department. I think that you always have to state in your essay, what you can bring to that fellowship or that scholarship or to the government to the state of the program how with them investing, investing in you, I'll be a benefit to them. And once you do that I think you will have a great chance of getting the scholarship. And it's important to ask people to read your essays. Just because you think something makes sense someone else can read it and completely not understand what you meant to say. So it helps, it doesn't even have to be a professor friends are more honest than your professors might be so have a friend read your essay and let them, and let them tell you if it makes sense. And the last tip and trick we have is to follow up and even sometimes get on the phone, the phone on the people at Gilman people at American Councils. Through all the fellowship and scholarships they're always willing to answer any emails or phone calls. I know for me when I applied for the Kenny Kenny larger youth exchange program. Before I even was awarded the scholarship, I call sky and Adam at American Councils almost 100 times, his accent simple questions are expressing my concerns. And I think they really will appreciate that. Awesome. Well, thank you guys so much for your tips. So with that, I'm going to stop the screen share but folks please feel free to flood us in the chat with any questions. And I will ask our sort of fellow panelists various questions that you guys have sort of asked us. But again, please feel free to check out study abroad.state.gov to find opportunities fellowships funding, you can't get awards you don't apply for so apply. So with that, I sort of will launch into our Q&A. And I think I'll start by asking this question to Jada. But we'll also ask Markel as well. So how do you see study abroad kind of as a career launcher and getting you where you want to go. Yeah, I mean, I think sort of, there's this thing like the road of fellowships like once you get one it's like sort of they continue on after like either apply for more and hopefully get more. And that definitely is sort of the path that I've seen. And so if I hadn't studied abroad in CLS I think one I, I'm not sure if I would have been as competitive maybe for a State Department internship and able to intern with the Bureau that houses CLS. I've gotten so much from my internship enough to know that I definitely see myself in a career within the State Department. And I don't think if I hadn't studied abroad in Korea and sort of gotten those experiences to know. Oh, I love traveling I love international travel and I also like what I'm able to bring to people in those countries and also what I'm gaining from them. And now that I'm a junior, it's fast approaching where it's time to make some tough decisions. And I think without study abroad it would make it even a harder decision on what I want it to do. I want to be a Foreign Service Officer. Eventually want to be a diplomat of Portuguese. And I think it's very important if you want to go in Foreign Service or any government position is really important to get your feet wet is really see if you can do the job or if you even enjoy going. And when I went to Eastern New Year when I went to Bulgaria, both the positive and negative feelings I had, while there, it really further affirmed that I really want to, you know, be a Foreign Service Officer. So, I think once you, once you study abroad and you basically have to, you know, be going into a government field but anything you're going into I think it's important to get your feet wet before you actually, you know, know if you want to do that. No, awesome, like those are great answers and then I'm going to actually ask you guys a harder question. Um, so I want to know, did you have any doubts about going abroad where you freaked out like was it petrifying to get on a plane like what was that entire experience like and would you do it again. I can start off. So I was definitely terrified to be studying abroad, one because I'd studied abroad before in Spain but I had been taking Spanish at that point for seven years. And so I knew Spanish proficiently and going to Korea I knew almost nothing I knew nothing about my host family I just knew it was a woman we had not had any contact. And I was I was nervous on the plane getting off the plane. There was not a minute until like I met my host family that I wasn't just shivering I think with nerves. But you get there and the world isn't ending and everything is fine they understand that you don't know the language. And it was a lot of pointing it was a lot of moments of frustration to the point of tears where I just couldn't get my point across or what I needed from somebody. My host mom felt the same she's like what is she talking about. But I mean, at the very end of it those experiences one make you a more well rounded person, you need those sort of scary experiences that take you out of your comfort zone. And obviously because like I've returned to sort of the world of international education I want to do it again if COVID wasn't happening I wouldn't be doing it again. And so I think it was, it was all worth it in the end, obviously. So for me, I was terrified of flying. I was terrified when I got it. I was terrified when I had to go to pre departure orientation I was terrified when I landed I was terrified through the whole experience but it wasn't that terrified as if I was scared and uncomfortable. I was just terrified of what the neck like what, what things would I learn next so what would my next experience with the very local. So it, I think, um, it's good to have doubts because I guess that proves that you're human. I think we all had doubts and all aspects of our lives but most importantly, all the times I look myself in the mirror and I say okay, I think I can do this. That's the whole company to have myself I was in Bulgaria, and when I was applying for the program, and ultimately it turned out okay as I am sitting here today, telling you to go. And I mean, I guess sort of piggybacking off of that like what actually made you want to intern with the Department of State what made you remotely interested in careers and public service they're not on everybody's radar. So give us a look into that. So I think when I came back from CLS the one thing that I was thinking about that was constantly on my mind was why didn't I know about CLS earlier like there's, there's other sort of fellowship programs like Miss Lee that start in high school and I just never heard of them when everybody else in my cohort had been preparing for CLS for a long time or at least a couple of years. If they hadn't gotten in the in the first time and I was just very lucky that I got in my first go round. And I was like well I want to make these study abroad programs accessible I want to help bring more people of color to these programs, because I think we need these opportunities and I think we bring so much to these programs. And so, when I was looking for internships for sort of my junior year, I was like I would love to sort of work with CLS again and really any study abroad program that will take me. And so I applied for the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. And here I am and I'm loving what I'm doing I'm halfway through my internship now it's gone by very quickly. Without CLS I don't think I would have ever figured out like, oh I think I want to go into sort of international education and study abroad programs and bringing them to minority communities. But I'm very happy that I applied, even though I was very nervous about getting in, but it's all worked out once again. Yeah, so basically what made you want to be an intern at the State Department and how did that fit in with not only your study abroad plans but your public service plans and tell us more. Yeah, so I actually found out about the Virtual Student Federal Service Program while I was in Bulgaria. It's so funny because I actually have a Google Doc on it when I'm going to apply for certain things how I want to get them. And I think I decided that I wanted to get both aspects of being a Foreign Service Officer. But actually on the ground in the country doing the work but you also have the people back in the United States of America actually don't work here to help those people on the ground. So I just want to get both aspects of the career really want to have in the future. And yeah. Yeah, awesome. That's really, really useful. Um, so I mean, I guess when you guys have been growing after these opportunities whether it's applying for, you know, yes abroad or Gilman or CLS or the internships, like, how are you guys managing the recommendation front because I know seeing like oh three recommenders or two recommenders is a scary thing so how did you guys navigate that process. Um, so for me, I think I'm a very introverted person so one asking for recommendations was very hard for me because I assume people just know nothing about me. So I'm very afraid to ask them for any recommendations or for anyone to say anything nice about me. But my professors, I think one thing is to know that professors are very much willing to write recommendations they're doing it all day long. And it was sort of, I had to take that initiative for asking for recommendations from people for CLS like my Korean professor who I was like we've only had class together for a semester. But I really wanted him to write a recommendation and so if you do find a recommender who you might, you might think like oh they don't know me very well, take that initiative to say can I come into your office to just tell you about who I am the program that I want to apply for, and they're very willing like I never had a professor tell me no. They're just like oh can I hear more about why you want to apply. And so it's just about getting over that fear and reaching out to people who might have surprising things to say about you. So for me, I think it's very important to build that connections with all your professors, even your teachers from high school. I actually have an 11th grade teacher. I talk to almost every day and she will write recommendations for me anytime I ask.  They'll keep that in the back of their mind and you should show up to class and be participating as well. And when you need a recommendation. I feel like as long as you come to them in a timely manner because they are, you know, stressed out with being a professor or teacher. They will do it for you hands down that's have been my experience for all on my recommended. No, that's awesome and super useful. And I mean I guess kind of related to that. I mean you guys are alums of various ECA programs. Who have you stayed in touch with anybody on your programs from, you know, when you study abroad or people in host country, or was this sort of a one and done like what's that look like at this point. I have stayed in touch with like my very close friends who I made in Korea like I'm still in touch with my language partner and the friends that I met through him. I'm close with my cohort like I'm FaceTiming one of my friends from CLS Sunday, and we've had various reunions since the program has ended. And just, I think two weeks ago one of my Korean friends is in a film class and they had to review get out. And he's like, I don't understand this can you explain it to me and so we FaceTimed and I explained to him, get out and sort of the African American experience as it relates to get out. And at the end he didn't get a great grade, but he enjoyed the conversation I think there was a translation problem, but we still stay very much in touch. I think that for me that's that's actually my favorite part about study abroad. Many of my friends after high school I was, I was really worried about, wow, all of my friends are going to college and I'm going to be going to Bulgaria on the behind friends blah blah blah. But after my experience, I realized that I'm the only one in my group that can say I have international friends, I have friends in Bulgaria, I have friends in the Philippines. I was able to keep, keep in touch with the Fulbright Commission in Bulgaria, who hopes for me to apply to be a Fulbrighter in Bulgaria. I'm still able to keep in touch with Peace Corps alumni and also my cohort. I actually took a trip around on United States and North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming for a little camping trip so that's one great thing about study abroad is the relationship that you will gain. So that's awesome phenomenal answers. And one thing sort of for the audience's awareness, especially with CLS, Gilman and Fulbright, something kind of cool that has come into existence is something where you actually get preferential from having four federal jobs if you're Gilman or CLS alum, it's called non competitive eligibility so for those of you who've heard of Peace Corps, you know how like Peace Corps reps come back and they have a pathway into the federal government. The same applies for Gilman CLS and Fulbright alumni. You basically have one year of non competitive eligibility. So you can extend that up to three years if you're still a student. If you're doing something relevant that the hiring authority thinks is relevant, or if you're serving in the military. And so for any of you guys who sort of apply for these programs and you're thinking like hey, I might want to work for the Department of Agriculture, like this is a helpful way to sort of get past all of the tape of USA jobs. I do a lot of special sessions specifically for ECA alumni. So we'll do mentor talks and bring in senior people who maybe have careers that you're interested in and Gilman and CLS do all sorts of specialty projects for their alumni and follow on activities.  So I will stop on that tangent and get back to the question. But I guess for, and this I think is good for both Jada and Markel studying languages can be incredibly challenging, especially brand new ones so can you talk a little bit about the experience of studying languages overseas. What made you interested and why you're still studying languages and how that fits in with what you want to do. Yeah, I mean for me. I'd always wanted to learn Korean and there just was not the opportunity until I got to college and I knew that I wanted to become at least proficient in Korean which is why I found which is how I found CLS. And when you're in the country and having to learn the language I think there is a slightly higher level of difficulty because you're living and talking with people who you desperately want to communicate with better. And you're like how do I become better at Korean like so I can talk with my friends so I can just like communicate like how I do in the US. And so I do think there was a level of difficulty there. But I think, especially if I can only speak for CLS obviously the classroom experience is just amazing, like, it feels like you're in class all day but you're learning so much. You go outside and like you're talking to one of your Korean friends and they're like, Wow, that's a really cool grammar thing you just use like when did you learn that. And so it's definitely difficult and I think for me it was difficult coming back because I wasn't experiencing the same level of difficulty with my Korean learning.  Like the language learning never stopped and that was something that I still cherish to this day to be able to continue speaking in Korean when I need to. I think learning the language of any country you decide to go to is very important and it is really, it's really a respecting for the actual locals that are there. And I think it's really well being in Bulgaria for that year. Anytime where I said a little Bulgarian word or I said Bulgarian word but it was wrong or I said a sentence and it sound backwards they would laugh and say we thank you for actually trying to learn. Because sometimes you know, countries may look at as Americans as we go to their country and we just demand that they know English. We meet on Americans and we're actually trying to learn the language and we're actually trying to make relations with them. It really helps them on really, I think it really helps them to build a relationship with us. And also with me, I'm currently studying Portuguese is because I decided that I do want to go to African country with that speech Portuguese. So after Bulgaria, after looking at the language school that I was in while there. I decided okay so learning Bulgarian now. I don't think I want to continue here but I appreciate the experience but I have to figure out a language I really want to learn and how I can use that from different countries and that's when I decided Portuguese. That's awesome. So we've got a fun audience question that I really like. That's a little bit further out of what we've been talking about so far. But do Bulgarians Panamanians Koreans learn about black leaders like Frederick Douglas Washington George Washington Carver Booker T Washington divorce. What was that like and did this come up in conversation and yeah. I just from my experience, I don't think the Koreans had any sort of idea about black history at all like I think their only frame of reference was sort of, they've heard about slavery, and maybe like they studied about the Civil War and that was about it. So that's another frame of reference for like black people and specifically black Americans like they talked a lot about Michael Jordan, Nicki Minaj, it seemed like the Anaconda video was just suddenly becoming popular in Korea, so it was a weird sort of rise and Nicki Minaj, and I think oh and Barack Obama of course so like those were their frame of reference for sort of like black Americans that they knew and sort of black leaders. It was difficult because that's a couple of different stereotypes to deal with like they had a certain image of like black women, and a certain image of like black men, like being either I guess the president or like they play sports. And so that was difficult because it was sort of like when we were having conversations about black history we just didn't have the same cultural basis. And I was like, Oh, you should look up this and like I would write and write it in English and they would look it up later But I think that was one thing that was great about getting to be there it sort of got the more interested in black history because I was telling you them about things they had never heard of before. That's actually a very interesting question. Currently in Panama now.  I think everybody knows Barack Obama but while in Bulgaria. They only knew Martin Luther King Jr. Barack Obama and the same thing as data said, they can acknowledge Cardi B they don't really know any of the figures that were taught in America. And that's one of the reasons why I did the black history my presentation and while I was in the area went around the country is because they didn't even really know about the civil rights movement. So it was an interesting thing to do and learn. Yeah, that's super helpful. Thank you guys for taking a stab at that. So we've got about five minutes left. And so we're coming to the end of our time. But I guess for each of you, what would sort of be your biggest piece of advice and applying to any of these opportunities or preparing to participate in these opportunities that you kind of wish you'd known going in. I think something I wish I'd known so maybe my experience could have even could have been even more amazing was don't be afraid to just jump in to like difficult conversations or sort of difficult positions to be put in like I was when I was there my first week I was sort of like I don't know the language I'm very scared that people are going to call me dumb for not knowing what I'm saying, but people, especially when you're going to these sort of critical language countries, they really appreciate that you're even taking the time to learn their language. So my advice is don't be afraid to sort of jump in and interact with the people that you're staying with living with an interacting with because they appreciate it and you gain so much from those conversations. I think for me, and I don't even know this is correct to say but don't have any expectations. I think that's one thing that I wish I could have changed from your area is because I went in said okay I'm going to go to help him to have all this and all that is, and then when the things weren't happening, I thought my experience was like, not in boy. Well, if you just don't expect anything and just walking unknown, allow the happiness allow the fear to guide you just through the experience. I think that will be very helpful because you expect things and it don't happen. Then you want to come home early and then you're not comfortable. And I think it's better just not to expect anything and just go in for the ride. Now that's really fantastic and so sort of I just want to recap with a couple of quick things for the audience before we send you to the power panel which you absolutely don't want to be late for or miss. So if you're at all thinking about any of these programs that we've talked about, if you want to find out more information about them, go to study abroad.state.gov. If you forget that you can just Google study abroad State Department will be the number one thing that pops up, but there is funding for you to go overseas, and we do the exact same thing for the international community coming into the State Department. So Google to your friend, and please reach out with any questions that you guys have real people answer them. And we want to make these opportunities available to you, but apply, apply, apply. And always check out our website careers.state.gov if you remotely want to do an internship or at least explore the possibility of doing one, because we need talented awesome people like you to like show up, get on the plane and do these things. And so, I'm so glad you guys all are here for this conference it's one of my favorite things I love doing it in person I wish we were all in HST and we could sort of be chatting over coffee. Thank you thank you. And again, after our session, go to the main hall, and the power panel is going to immediately begin. But with that, I'm going to give Markel and Jada a chance to give their last like 30 seconds on something before we unfortunately will be to the end of our time. Um, you have everything to gain from study abroad and nothing to lose I highly recommend it I don't think anyone's ever regretted their study abroad experience or language learning experience. Yeah, the world is your home take advantage of these opportunities that the State Department provides, and I assure you will not be disappointed. Perfect and reminder for anybody who's applying for Gilman we just extended that deadline so applications are now due March 9. So if you're a Pell Grant recipient and want to remotely study abroad in the next year and a half, you can apply, you don't have to exactly know what you're doing in the same way you previously would have. And if you want to do CLS that application will open at the very end of the fall in September and be due in November so you can start dreaming up whether you want to do Portuguese or Korean or Urdu, because we guarantee there is a language for you. And so I think with that the stream is about to stop. But thank you all so much for coming and enjoy the HBCU foreign policy conference and good luck with your studies and everything that you guys are doing. Thanks so much.


Hello everyone, this is Ahmed Dan of AhmedDan.com You are watching one of my Egypt travel videos. In the last episode, I took you to the hanging hidden churches in the caves and today I'll show you the rest of my day. It looked a bit old and run down but that added charm to the place. The cafe was half full but still noisy. I saw lots of ceiling fans running as it was hot in winter in December. The black tea with lots of sugars tasted unreal. I had black tea before in many places but I was not sure why it in Egypt tasted so good. 3 teas costed 10 Egyptian pounds which would be very close to 1 Canadian dollars. I also bought a beef shish kabob sandwich for 20 Egyptian pound or LE and a Dasani 750 ml water for 4 LE so everything was really cheap. Thank you for watching this video. There will be more Egypt videos coming up so I'll see you shortly.


The state's Human Services Commissioner says a psychiatric care hospital in Baxter would be negatively impacted if proposed Republican budget cuts become reality. Emily Piper visited the community behavioral health hospital in Baxter yesterday and met with area health leaders about the situation. Piper says the proposed $600 million in cuts would translate to the loss of 200 positions at state-operated facilities and programs. That would affect places like community behavior or health hospitals in Baxter and in Bemidji. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.


Demi-Lenell Peters keeps winning, joins Miss USA selection committee. Former Miss USA and Miss Universe Demi-Lenell Peters is flourishing on level 100, this week being unveiled as a new judge on the Miss USA selection committee. This was announced by Miss USA and Miss Teen USA organizers on Twitter in a post gushing over our star. The Miss USA preliminary competition kicks off on Monday, with the Miss USA pageant being held on May 2. Demi-Lenell was crowned Miss South Africa in 2017 and several months later was crowned Miss Universe. She is the second title holder from Mzansi. Margaret Gardner was crowned Miss Universe in 1978. Demi-Lenell is currently living in the USA and is engaged to former professional American football quarterback and baseball player Tim Tebow. The couple got engaged in January.


The Brainerd Public Library is known for displaying local artwork throughout the year, but for the next month, they're displaying a different type of craft. Those who visit the library will have the chance to admire quilts designed by Cherry Wood Hand dyed fabrics out of Baxter. Cherry Wood has been perfecting the hand dyeing process for over 25 years and they pride themselves in making their fabrics look and feel like suede. It's a pretty much all day process. There's many steps along the way.  I've got two, three employees that helped me do it. We start out with unbleached muslin and we go through the steps and then we come up with gradations of colors. So we sell them in collections like this. But all of our fabric is solid color, but it looks like suede. It's got like a texture to it. So that's our trademark. Cherry Wood is also known for their designs and clothing. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.