Students Awarded Italy Trip Scholarships

Eight Fairmont State University students have been selected through a competitive application process to participate in "Roads to Appalachia through Italy," a student tour experience sponsored through the Student Affairs Travel Abroad Scholarship in collaboration with the West Virginia Folklife Center at FSU.

The scholarship winners are Jack Bates of Fairmont, a psychology major; Jenna Facemire of Sutton, an elementary education, K-6, major; Celi Oliveto of Fairmont, a pre-secondary education and oral communications/English major; Kavi Patel, of Fairmont, a computer science major; Dominick Pellegrin of Fairmont, a political science major; Elizabeth Shroyer of Fairmont, a history major; Stephanie Slaubaugh of Eglon, an architecture major; and Ehrin Starcher of Huntington, an education, health 5-adult/Spanish pre-K-adult, major.

The June 11-25, 2007, trip to Italy explores the cultural roots of Italian traditions and Appalachian influences, emphasizing the unique similarities between Appalachia and Italia, especially Mezzogiorno (Southern Italy). Each student will gather research ideas that will be formulated into a project that will be presented before the educational community during the fall 2007 semester.

"The story of why and how the southern Italians came to Central Appalachia is an important part of our study abroad program, which will take us through the Mezzogiorno in the southern regions of Campania and Calabria where few tours travel," said Dr. Judy P. Byers, Abelina Suarez Professor of English and Folklore and Director of the W.Va. Folklife Center at FSU.

"This travel abroad has been designed as part of a year-long intensive study of Italian traditions and Appalachian influences on the culture."

Byers and Noel W. Tenney, Assistant Professor of Folklife Studies and Folk Cultural Specialist for the Folklife Center, are serving as co-directors for the student tour experience.

Students wrote essays of 750-1,000 words defining their desire for an immersion experience abroad and stating how the proposed international experience fits into their overall plan of academic study. Each student had to have two faculty letters of recommendation to accompany their application. Students also went through an interview process.

During the spring 2007 semester, which began in January, the Folklife Center has offered a study abroad course (Folk 3399) on Thursday evenings that reviews all of the historical, cultural and artistic sites and aspects of the travel program. The scholarship winners have been enrolled in this course. Conversational Italian has also been offered.

In the late 19th century, the American Industrial Revolution reached the Appalachian Region when coal was discovered in its hills. Workers were needed to mine the coal in a far greater abundance than Anglo-Celtic Germanic farmers could provide. The timing was right to introduce cheap labor into the hills from southern Europe because many immigrants were flocking to America seeking job opportunities and the promises of prosperity for themselves and their families. Of the different nationalities, 30 percent came from Italy, especially the southern part of the country. Many southern Italians were forced to leave their homeland in a massive emigration that stretched from the 1880s to 1920s due to a range of frustrations and calamities: heavy taxes imposed by the government, natural disasters such as earthquakes and landslides, cholera, an infestation of plant lice that destroyed most of the wine industry and unpredictable periods of flooding and droughts that made farming a challenge.

"The tour will take us on an expanded journey of the Italian peninsula from the canals of Venice in the north and the rich renaissance of Florence to imperial and spiritual Rome in the center, with many historical, cultural and famous sites along the way," Byers said.

The itinerary includes stops in the following cities: Rome, Pompeii, Naples, Benevento, Cosenza, San Giovanni in Fiore, Sorrento, Assisi, Ravenna, Venice, Bologna and Florence.