Bring in the expert, Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Ed Beardsley, professor emeritus of history, presented his living interpretation of the late president for the teachers who have been on the Columbia campus for the past six weeks through a program sponsored by the American Councils for International Education.

Each of the teachers--44 women and six men--received Awards for Excellence in Teaching from the councils to travel to the United States for English language training and to experience American culture. Thirty came from Russia, and the other 20 from Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan.

For most, it's their first trip to the United States.

"They are wonderful teachers with wonderful ideas," said Margaret Perkins, sponsored programs coordinator in English Programs for Internationals (EPI). She noted that they're good students, too: "They've been like sponges."

"Many of them have been teaching for 20 years," she added. "Winning the award is quite coveted."

The sponsoring organization asked USC to concentrate on three goals during the program: English language training, methodology, and special topics.

Working with teachers from EPI and professors in the English department, the teachers—who teach English and American studies—attended classes from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. every day, worked on language training, picked up tips from local teachers, and learned, especially, about computers.

"Maybe 10 of them had some experience with computers, but it was all new to the rest. But they took to it like a duck takes to water and did great," Perkins said.

The teachers, who stayed in Preston College, looked at special topics involving professors from throughout the University. In addition to Beardsley's performance as part of history week, Blease Graham, dean of the College of Criminal Justice, discussed government and law. John McFadden, the Benjamin E. Mays professor in the College of Education, talked about leadership. Jane White, associate professor in the Department of Instruction and Teacher Education, demonstrated an economics lesson, and Don Greiner, associate provost and dean of undergraduate affairs, talked about American literature.

Outside the classroom, the teachers traveled to Atlanta and to Charleston to visit Drayton Hall and the beach, toured the Statehouse, and talked with Sen. Warren Giese. They also visited Riverbanks Zoo with children from the Epworth Children's Home. They watched American movies, including Forrest Gump and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and caught Workshop Theater's production of Bubbling Brown Sugar.

They even learned how to line dance with the Carolina Stampede.

On Sundays, the teachers ate dinner with Columbia-area families.

"That was wonderful," Perkins said. "The American families enjoyed it so much that they wanted to do other things with them, taking the teachers to thrift shops, the movies, and to church, and inviting them to cook Russian food for them."

After a weekend in New York City, the group will fly to Washington before returning home later in August.

For EPI staff members in the classroom, the program has been as much about learning as it has about teaching. "It's been a colleague-to-colleague experience," Perkins said. "They have shown us what they do in their classrooms, and we've learned from them, too."

For the EPI program as a whole, "collaboration has been key. With the University and Columbia communities sharing expertise, EPI has provided a teacher training program of such scope that the professional synergy has been electric." Perkins said.

Exchange program was a first for USC's EPI program

This year is the first that USC has sponsored the four-year-old exchange program offered by the American Councils for International Education.

In addition to the 50 teachers on the Columbia campus, 40 other teachers from Russia and other independent states spent six weeks studying in Montana. During the last weekend of July, the teachers in Montana traveled to Columbia to share ideas at a series of joint meetings.

At those meetings, American teachers who have been chosen by the American Councils for International Education to visit Russia and eight newly independent states this fall got a chance to meet and mingle with their international peers.