July 21, 2007
Staff Report
Burlington College students will be headed to Cuba next year under a
newly established study abroad program with the island country.
The college signed an agreement in May that allows 15 students each
spring semester to study at the University of Havana.
Burlington College President Jane O'Meara Sanders said students will
take up to 16 credits, including a core course in Cuban Studies that
encompasses history, politics, economics, geography, international
relations, philosophy and culture. Students will also be able to take up
to 20 hours a week in intermediate or advanced Spanish.
The Ludwig Foundation will offer a course that includes field trips to
locations throughout the island and provide students with an orientation
to Cuban arts and culture.
The college has secured student living accommodations in central Havana
that's operated by ANAP, a farmers' co-op and hired a resident director.
Students will pay the regular full-time semester tuition of $9,780, room
and board of $3,360, which includes two meals a day, $1,900 to cover
field trips and other expenses and $150 for insurance. Students are also
responsible for roundtrip airfare to Havana.
College officials met with university officials as well as several
prominent government figures including Ricardo Alarcon, president of the
Cuban Senate, considered the third most powerful official in Cuba behind
Fidel Castro and Raul Castro, who assumed interim power last summer from
his ailing brother.
"That's kind of exciting because we've been able to make the kind of
connections that are unusual," said Sanders, the wife of U.S. Sen.
Bernard Sanders, I-Vt.
Sanders said that Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie and Florida cattle broker John
Parke Wright IV helped arrange contacts with Cuban officials. Dubie has
supported increased trade and educational ties with Cuba. Wright
arranged the sale of the first Vermont cows to the island two years ago.
Burlington College joins the University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill, American University and Harvard University in establishing a
spring study abroad program on the island of 4.4 million people.
Because of a 46-year-old U.S. embargo that chokes off most trade with
Cuba, the program required U.S. government approval. Two years ago, the
college obtained a license from the U.S. Treasury Department, which
monitors U.S. financial transactions.
The Bush administration has discouraged U.S. contacts with Cuba in an
attempt to force Fidel Castro's communist regime to come to heel and
make democratic reforms. Despite that policy, Burlington College
encountered few obstacles in establishing its program.
"I would say it was really a lot easier in some ways then I expected,"
said Sandy Baird, director of the college's legal education program.
Baird said that Cuban officials "are very open, very welcoming, very
eager to have relations" with the college.
Both Sanders and Baird said given the questions surrounding Fidel
Castro's health, U.S-Cuba relations are at a turning point.
"There are up and coming leaders in the ministries, people in their
40's, that are interested in normalizing relations and I think we should
get to know them," Sanders said.
She said one of the goals of the college is to teach students about
globalization, fostering peace, and the "best way to do that is through
communication and knowledge."
Baird added: "It's very important to have a policy that's at least open
to thinking about change and I think our students are really interested
in that also."
The Cuba study abroad program isn't limited to Burlington College
students. Students at other institutions can apply to matriculate for
the spring semester and transfer credits back to their respective
schools. The college also has study abroad programs in Mexico, Italy,
Nicaragua and Ecuador.
Contact Bruce Edwards at bruce.edwards@rutlandherald.com.
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