(Posted 2-18-99)
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
UNCG COURSE BEING TAUGHT IN RUSSIA
AND OVER WEB TO UNCG STUDENTS
By Deborah Durkee
GREENSBORO -- Dr. Kathleen M. Ahern might be involved in the ultimate distance
learning course this semester. She is teaching two sections of the same
course, and her classes are 7,000 miles apart -- one in Russia, the other
at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
 Dr.
Kathleen Ahern is teaching students in Russia this semester, but students
at UNCG are keeping up with the course through the World Wide Web. (Photo:
Bob Cavin) |
A lecturer in the Department of German and Russian at UNCG, Ahern is spending
the 1999 spring semester in Kazan, Russia. She began teaching a course
titled "African-American Literary Ties to Russian Intellectual Thought"
to students at Kazan State University and also to students at UNCG over
the World Wide Web on Feb. 1.
Working under a grant awarded by the Fulbright program, Ahern, along with
UNCG's Division of Continual Learning, put together a Web-based course
designed to allow students in both countries to correspond with each other.
The course uses the Web to capture the essence of the Fulbright program,
which is to "increase mutual understanding between the people of the United
States and the people of other countries."
Ahern, who is from Mebane, is excited about teaching in two countries at
once. "If I were teaching a class just in American literature or just in
Russian literature, that would be exciting alone, but to teach a class
that touches on both cultures and then to ask students representing those
cultures to comment, is really exciting," she said.
The course is just now gearing up on the UNCG end. Jason "Guhl" Lentz,
a junior from Burlington studying Russian and computers, is taking Ahern's
course and likes the idea of communicating with Russian students. "The
e-mails and the discussion back and forth with the students over there
will help me flex my language muscle and give me a new perspective from
students over there," Lentz said. "I think it's an interesting way to discuss
the literature dominant in both cultures, and we can help each other fill
out our partial knowledge on both sides."
Raleigh resident Lane Price, a distance education curriculum consultant
with UNCG's Division of Continual Learning, helped Ahern put the course
into Web format. Price took Ahern's discussion questions, quizzes, essay
topics and lectures and put them in a format conducive to an independent
study course. Links from the course's home page to UNCG's Jackson Library
created a "virtual library," which enables students from both countries
to do subject-specific, online research on the writers and topics Ahern
discusses in the course.
 Jason
Lentz of Burlington is one of the UNCG students using the World Wide Web
to take part in Dr. Kathleen Ahern's course on Russian and American literature.
(Photo: Bert VanderVeen) |
Ahern faced many challenges in changing the course into the ultimate distance-learning
course. "There was the challenge of getting the material in a format that
could stand alone and yet let me still feel like I'm part of the process
of teaching and learning," she said. Another technical challenge was getting
computer equipment that is transportable and usable in Russia.
"As far as the equipment is concerned, going to Russia is not as easy as
going to England," Price said. UNCG's Department of Client Services set
up Ahern's keyboard and configured her disk drive to display the Russian
alphabet. The Dell laptop was set up with an Ethernet card to allow Ahern
to connect to a network, and a video camera was added.
"We connected an Internet or Web cam, popular in the United States, primarily
so she could better use the Internet class," said freshman Tim Wilk, a
UNCG information systems and operations management major from Greensboro,
who helped set up Ahern's laptop. She also has a digital camera which will
allow still shots of Ahern to be sent back for Price to put on the course
Web page. After arriving in Kazan, Ahern had to find a usable phone line
to enable her to teach to students 7,000 miles away.
On a personal level, Ahern's preparation for her trip to Russia involved
sending her 7-year-old daughter, Wallis, to Chapel Hill to learn Russian
and also tutoring her at home. Wallis is attending a Russian school and
will keep in contact with South Mebane Elementary School via e-mail. Ahern's
mother, Ellen Blanck, a retired school psychologist from Boone, went along
to help Wallis adjust. Throughout the semester, Ahern's husband, Daniel,
will travel between Russia and Mebane.
Other challenges of teaching in Russia involve everyday things. Before
leaving the states, Ahern had to prepare for the unavailability of photocopying
and a campus bookstore. "There's no Barnes and Noble or UNCG bookstore
to go and pick up copies of ‘Invisible Man' or ‘Black Boy,'" Ahern said.
She had to bring all of the books and course materials with her on the
plane.
The course looks at places in the histories of African-Americans and Russians
where the two cultures come together. "The majority of what we're reading
is early 20th Century Russian and African-American literature that talks
about the African-American intellectuals' fascination with the emerging
Soviet Union," Ahern said. Students are studying writers W.E.B. DuBois,
Ralph Ellison, Richard Wright, Langston Hughes, Paul Robeson and Russian
poet Alexander Pushkin, whose maternal great-grandfather was a freed black
slave who worked in the Czar's court.
Most of the students taking the course at UNCG have an interest in Russian
studies. By press time Ahern hadn't received a roster of her class in Russia,
but assumes her students there have an interest in perfecting their English
speaking, reading and writing.
"Kazan State just started a new literature studies program there, so they
are really excited about having someone coming from the United States working
with a topic that touches on American literature," Ahern said.
Ahern plans to lecture to her Russian students in the Russian language,
and in turn, they will do some of their writing in English. She will hold
discussion forums over the Web intended to accomplish her Fulbright goal
to increase mutual understanding between students from both countries.
"I hope that the students in Kazan and the students at UNCG will be able
to post their ideas and then respond to each other's ideas," Ahern said.
Ahern has taught at UNCG since 1993 where she specializes in Russian literature.
She received her bachelor's degree in Russian language from Arizona State
University, her master's in Russian Literature and doctorate in Slavic
Literatures from UNC-Chapel Hill. She grew up in Greenville, S.C., and
graduated from high school in Boone.
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