By Tony Perry, Times Staff Writer. Los Angeles Times. Monday, January 17, 2000
Education: San Diego State, which has extensive international business program, will sign agreement this week with the University of Havana.
SAN DIEGO--Alex Velez, 20, a business major at San Diego State University, added a biography of Che Guevara to his reading list recently. And he's looking for a good travelers guide to Cuba.
How better to prepare to be among the first group of San Diego State students to study at the University of Havana?
Even as relations between the United States and Cuba are strained by controversy over the fate of 6-year-old Elian Gonzales, San Diego State University President Stephen Weber is leading a delegation to Havana this week to sign an unprecedented student exchange accord with the University of
Havana.
Weber and other college officials making the trip say they do not expect to be swept up in the anti-American fervor gripping the Cuban public as the controversy continues over whether the youngster, who was rescued at sea on Thanksgiving Day, should be repatriated. The State Department told
them there is no reason to cancel their trip, though they were advised to keep a low profile.
Velez will not be making the trip. He'll be in San Diego going to class, brushing up on his Spanish and working at his father's charter boat fishing business.
Other U.S. colleges have sent students to Cuba for several weeks or during midsemester breaks. But this agreement marks the first time that a U.S. college has sent students for at least a semester.
"The minute I heard about it, I was all over it," said Velez. "I can't wait."
Weber and faculty members at the school's burgeoning international business program are eager to add Cuba to the long list of international sites where San Diego State students take courses. The program has sent students to 125 foreign locations on five continents.
"The students understand where their future is: It's global," said Weber.
Students also know how to get the attention of college presidents. When Velez heard the exchange program was being organized, he sent an e-mail to Weber and the president sent a return e-mail with instructions on how to apply.
The San Diego State side of the program will begin modestly, probably with Velez and two other students going to Havana next academic year. But Weber envisions it growing quickly to 30 students or more.
Unlike exchange programs at some colleges, San Diego State takes a sink-or-swim approach. Students are not accompanied by professors from home. They live in dormitories or with local families and attend the same classes as local students.
"We don't want any hand-holding for our students," said Steven Loughrin-Sacco, co-director of the university's Center for International Business Education and Research. "We want them to go through the cultural shock that is a natural part of the progress of studying abroad.
We want them to solve their own problems."
Cuba has been a particularly prized location for an exchange program.
There is a school of thought that says the United States may soon drop its embargo on Cuba, and the island nation will open itself to private investment in a way unseen since the revolution. And San Diego State already has exchange agreements with every other country in Latin America.
And how did San Diego State gain a step on other business schools?
Like much in the real world, it was a matter of knowing the right people. An aide to San Diego Mayor Susan Golding knows an aide to Cuban President Fidel Castro. When the latter was in Tijuana, the former began a dialogue.
That led to phone calls and faxes. Last spring, Loughrin-Sacco was in Havana talking to his academic counterparts on the business faculty at the University of Havana. The university has agreements with several U.S. colleges--most notably a joint Caribbean studies curriculum with the
University of Buffalo.
During the spring visit, Loughrin-Sacco was told to stand by for a possible 2 a.m. meeting with Castro. It's a common experience for visiting notables: being told to wait at their hotels for a possible call from the maximum leader.
"The call never came," said Loughrin-Sacco. "We learned later that Fidel had not finished his . . . May Day speech."
Although there are no plans for a meeting with Castro during the upcoming visit, Weber, Loughrin-Sacco and the other San Diegans will be ready. They have a possible inducement for the baseball-loving Castro: With the group will be an official from the San Diego Padres ready to discuss
making baseball part of the exchange, on the college or professional level.
"Baseball has no borders," said Enrique Morones, the Padres vice president for Latino and international programs.
Started 10 years ago, the international business program at San Diego State has 725 undergraduate students, making it the biggest such program in the United States. Starting next academic year, every student will be required to study at an international site.
The San Diego-Havana exchange is not without critics.
Weber met with local representatives of Alpha 66, a Miami-based group implacably opposed to Castro and his Communist regime. He declined, however, to talk to Radio Marti, the Miami radio station that, with U.S. support, broadcasts in Cuba and has been accused of an anti-Castro slant.
An Alpha 66 leader says cooperation between the United States and Castro's government only "prolongs the suffering of the Cuban people." Weber responds that he believes that educational exchanges will lead to greater economic and political freedom in Cuba.
As yet, the agreement does not commit the University of Havana to send students to San Diego, although that will be a key part of the conversations. What Weber hopes is not part of the conversation is the controversy over whether young Elian should be returned to Cuba or remain in Miami.
The San Diego delegation's official position is that it has no position on the issue.
"We're educators," Weber said. "That kind of decision is made way above our pay grade. I'll leave it to Janet Reno."
Copyright 2000 Los Angeles Times |