GlobalPittsburgh Intern Vase Mitev Helps Welcome Delegation of Educators from Ukraine Learning About U.S. Higher Education

By Vase Mitev

On November 7, 2014, GlobalPittsburgh hosted five Ukrainian educators and one facilitator for a program titled "Higher Education (USETI)." They were interested in various aspects of testing and education measurement.

The Ukrainian delegation with
intern Vase Mitev (left rear).

Upon arriving in Pittsburgh, the visitors met with their host families. Maryna Viktorivna Nabok and Bohdan Bohdanovych Tomenchuk were hosted by Geoff Claus and Helene Weinraub. Oleksiy Yuriyovych Nestyvaylo and Oleksandr Yuriyovych Zinkovskyy were hosted by William Lenaghan for the weekend and by Yulia Bolotskikh-Bhonsle and Kunal Bhonsle for the remaining time. The facilitator Olena Ostapivna Kotsur was hosted by Ali and Ira Mabel.

On Saturday November 8, the host families drove them to the Schenley Plaza where they met with Gail Shrott and Caroline Tibbetts for a visit to the Carnegie Museums of Art and Natural History. The visitors were impressed by this trip. They had lunch at the Waterfront shopping mall where they had an opportunity to shop at the stores at the Waterfront Mall. The entire group had dinner at Hokkaido Asian Buffet restaurant. The goal on Sunday November 9 was for the visitors to spend time with their host families and to learn more about the Pittsburgh community.

The group's first meeting on Monday November 10 was with Ken Service who is Vice Chancellor for Communications at the University of Pittsburgh. He provided the group with a discussion about the U.S. higher education system. They visitors were very involved and interested in this discussion and thought very highly of Mr. Service.

The time went fast but was also productive for the visitors. On Friday November 15, they had a discussion about placement testing at the Community College of Allegheny County provided by Larry Doparak and Bob Russo.

After this meeting, they had their closing lunch at the Bridges Restaurant at the Wyndham University Place with many of the people they met during the entire week. I was a part of this closing lunch. I saw how much the visitors enjoyed being a part of this program. They discussed the different experiences they had and how much they learned from Pittsburgh.

The visitors said that they were very engaged during their stay and appreciated their meetings arranged by GlobalPittsburgh. They also said that they gained different insights of how the U.S. higher education system works. They loved the people and enjoyed the food in Pittsburgh. All of the meetings were definitely interesting to the visitors, but most importantly, they said how successful and helpful this program was for them.

On Saturday November 15 they were driven back to the airport for their flight to Washington D.C.

(Vase Mitev is from Macedonia. He served as an intern at GlobalPittsburgh in the fall of 2014.)