Students discuss international opportunities

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MIFFLINTOWN - Retired Juniata County Extension Director George Settlemyer said he knows the value of international travel and study for students.

Several years ago, he put his money where his beliefs are and established an endowment at The Pennsylvania State University to aid students in international study opportunities. Settlemyer said funds from his endowment have helped 39 students study overseas, and "another 12 or 14 (will be helped) this year.''

Three recipients of his endowment - all College of Agriculture students at Penn State - talked about their international study experiences at Mifflintown Rotary's Farm-City event Thursday at the Family House restaurant in Mifflintown.

The students included Jackie Byler and David Silliman, who were part of a two and a half-week soil study in the country of Jordan, and Caitlyn Neale, who spent a year in Wales where she studied at Aberystwyth University.

They were accompanied to Mifflintown by Mark T. Sharer, director of development, and Marilyn McPheron, study abroad coordinator, for the College of Agriculture.

McPheron said many of the study abroad experiences are "imbedded short courses.'' She noted that the program had one-half of 1 percent of the students involved at the beginning and now 12 percent of students participate in international study experiences.

She noted that the soils study in Jordan was part of a soil and civilization course, and involved learning how the soil affected the original people who set up the civilization and how those people affected the soil.

Silliman, a landscape major, said he never thought about soil being very important until he took the class.

He described Jordan as having "everything in one place''- mountains, deserts and farming, with diverse crops such as fruits, vegetables, olives and watermelons, as well as many sheep and goats. The young people said they saw "a few'' Holstein cows.

"Everywhere you went, it was like being in another part of America,'' Silliman said.

Silliman was encouraged to tell the story of how he wore a bushy beard and long hair when he went to Jordan, hoping to "fit in,'' and found all the men clean shaven.

Byler, a turfgrass major, described the landscape of Jordan as lush green, rocky desert, sandy desert, places like the Grand Canyon, and the river valley has "with really, really nice soil.'' She said the students also "floated in the Dead Sea, snorkeled in the Red Sea, rode camels and visited ruins.''

"It's hard to fathom how old they are, I didn't realize there were so many Biblical sites'' in the country, Byler said.

In addition to soil sampling, the students visited farms and the Ministry of Agriculture.

Silliman said Jordan exports a lot of vegetables and is "pretty self-sufficient.'' Byler added that the country is running into problems because of water issues in the midst of the worst drought since 1969.

Byler said most of the Jordanian soil the students tested was "very, very nice soil, very fertile, a deep red color (and) very good for vegetables.''

To a question about Jordanians maintaining fertility in the soil for more than thousands of years, the students said residents fertilize, particularly with potash from the Dead Sea. Silliman said the Dead Sea is shrinking and becoming more saline, so the Jordanians want to build a canal from the Mediterranean Sea to bring water into the sea and create electricity as well.

Neale, an animal bioscience major who plans to become an equine surgeon, described her year in Wales, which she said is "a beautiful country with a rainy climate,'' with very different sections: mountains, streams and valleys and in other parts very old areas like "1920s Pittsburgh with mills smoking," and coal.

She said Welsh farmers are "very into'' organic farming, and there are a lot of greenhouses. She also said rabies has been eradicated in Wales since 1970, and animals are not vaccinated for rabies anymore. She noted that her classmates were very interested in the subject.

"Here, it's a major disease, there it was something they didn't know much about,'' she said.

Neale said she watched a small animal surgery as part of her study experience and found that the surgeons did not wear caps and gowns.

"I work for a veterinarian in Pennsylvania, and things like caps and gowns just don't apply over there,'' she said. She also said she enjoyed dissecting animals.

Neale also chuckled about an incident in her animal nutrition class when her fellow students were enthused over a "great'' paper they had received - which, she determined, came from Penn State.

"Penn State in the U.K., 6,000 miles from home,'' she said.

There are some dairy farms in Wales, but they are not prominent and they raise different breeds, Neale said.

"I said, 'Oh, an angus,' and they said, 'No, a Welsh black,''' she explained.

She also said the long-tailed Welsh mountain sheep are "pretty wild,'' and not approachable by humans.

Also on hand for the luncheon meeting were farmer guests of the Rotarians.

In other business, Mifflintown Rotarians plan to ring the Juniata County Chapter Salvation Army Christmas bell outside Schlegel's Store near East Salem on Dec. 6.

Grant Miller, Rotary vice president, chaired the meeting, and Joe Forney gave the invocation.