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Volume 104 • Number 13 • Tuesday, January 21, 2014 • PO Box 188 • 111 E. Jenkins • Maryville, MO
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Foreign students feel welcome through FIS By KEVIN BIRDSELL Staff writer
PHIL COBB/DAILYFORUM
Friends
Above: A group of Indian students attending Northwest Missouri State University is shown over the Christmas holidays with local resident Lana Cobb at the Maryville home of Jim and Dixie Davis. Left: Jim Davis helps Arpit Parekh celebrate his birthday. The Friends of International Students organization pairs young people from other countries attending Northwest with local families willing to offer their hospitality while introducing students to American culture and customs.
Most students at Northwest Missouri State University look forward to the winter break as a time to catch up with friends and family. But not every young person on campus has the luxury of going home for the holidays. While many students have only to drive an hour or so back to their hometowns, those who come from other countries are usually thousands of miles away from loved ones and the familiar haunts of childhood. Kranthi Nirmala, Koduru Karthik Reddy and Rama Krishna Raju are three such students. Each is more than 8,000 miles from their home in Andhra Pradesh, a state located along India’s southeastern coast. All three are attending Northwest in pursuit of degrees in computer science. The Christmas season can be a lonely time to be stranded in Maryville. Many cultures mark holidays around the first of the year, and in Andhra Pradesh, for example, there is a festival called Pongal, or Sankranthi, which takes place in mid-January to celebrate the end of harvest season. “By this time, everything should be harvested,” Karthik said. “We should celebrate that we are getting some money from our work. In the ancient days it would be done by now, but now it changes depending on the climate.” Pongal lasts three days, a time when most people get to stay home from work and spend time with their families. The first day celebrates new beginnings.
The second day focuses on cattle and the important part they play in the harvest. And the final day is filled with family gatherings and reunions. Rama Krishna said he called home for the celebration — and to wish his mother a happy birthday. But it was hardly the same as being there. While Karthik traveled to Atlanta to visit his aunt, Rama Krishna and Kranthi stayed in Maryville and made the best of things for the duration of the month-long break. “We just tried to explore the place,” Rama Krishna said. Of course with Maryville being the size that it is, that didn’t take long. “Generally the first question new students ask us is ‘What is there in Maryville?’” Rama Krishna said. “We make them prepared that it’s not a big place.” Kranthi agrees that the town doesn’t offer a lot of possibilities for entertainment, and that an evening out often takes the form of a movie or a trip to Walmart. On one recent Saturday, The Hangar did screen an Indian movie in Telegu, Karthik’s, Rama Krishna’s and Kranthi’s native language. The event was a first for the local cimemaplex. Aside from a lack of entertainment venues, another problem facing international students here is a shortage of transportation. “It’s not a big deal for us to walk a couple miles,” Karthik said. “But it’s hard to go out when it’s cold.” See FIS, Page 12
Tjeerdsma makes short list at SHSU
Mel Tjeerdsma By JASON LAWRENCE Sports editor
One Bearcat may be trading in his Green and White for the Orange and Blue of the Bearkats. Northwest athletic director Mel Tjeerdsma was to interview today for the head football coaching position at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas. “I still haven’t got coaching out of my system,” Tjeerdsma said. “Not that I was actively looking for a job. I just feel like I’ve got a lot of energy and a lot to offer in that area yet and they approached me about it.” Tjeerdsma, 67, returned to Northwest in April 2013 as
athletic director after thenAD Wren Baker accepted a position as deputy athletic director for internal affairs at the University of Memphis. Tjeerdsma had retired from coaching in 2010. As head football coach at Northwest, he compiled a record of 183-43 and won 12 MIAA titles and three NCAA Division II titles in 17 years, turning a team that went winless in his inaugural season in 1994 into a national power. Tjeerdsma has ties to Texas and coached for 10 years at Austin College, where he is the school’s winningest coach, having compiled a 59-39-4 record in 10 seasons. Tjeerdsma returned to Austin College following his retirement from Northwest and served on the college’s Institutional Advancement development team, leading athletic fundraising efforts. This also isn’t the first time Tjeerdsma has been linked to a Texas-based Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) school. He was a finalist for the University of Texas-San Antonio’s head coaching job when the university was starting a football program See TJEERDSMA, Page 12
KEVIN BIRDSELL/DAILY FORUM
MLK Day
Northwest students are shown participating in the university’s annual Peace March down Fourth Street in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. The march began at the J.W. Jones Student Union and proceed to the the Nodaway County Court House, where students representing various campus organizations delivered brief speeches.
Northwest students honor King By KEVIN BIRDSELL Staff writer
Northwest Missouri State University students of different races and cultural backgrounds gathered for a meal and a march Monday to honor the legacy of U.S. civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. The university’s annual King tribute began with a late-morning brunch attended by about 100 people in the J.W. Jones Student Union Ballroom where keynote speaker Robert Page Jr. delivered what amounted to a his-
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tory lesson emphasizing the worldchanging impact of King’s career. Page, who serves as assistant to the president at the Penn Valley Campus of Metropolitan Community College, began by talking about his own background and previous ties to Northwest. He also took a few joking shots at Bearcats fans, noting that he has a pair of degrees from the University of Central Missouri, and that his daughter attends Pittsburgh State University. Both schools are MIAA rivals to the Cats in football, basketball and
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other sports. Page’s speech dramatized how young people today can continue King’s quest for equality and social justice by focusing on the acronym LEADership, with the first four letters standing for legacy, empowerment, attitude and devotion. “It’s important to reach out to someone,” Page said. “If I can touch one person’s life, that’s what’s most important for me.” Following the brunch, students gathered outside the union for the traSee KING, Page 3
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