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SFSU Public Affairs Press Release

Published by the Public Affairs Office at San Francisco State University, Diag Center.

#072--February 8, 2000; FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: John Kroll
phone : 415/338-1665
e-mail: pubcom@sfsu.edu

SAN FRANCISCO STATE RECEIVES PLANNING GRANT TO DEVELOP REGIONAL HUMANITIES CENTER


The $50,000 grant is the only one awarded for the Pacific Region, covering five states and three territories.

SAN FRANCISCO, February 8, 2000---The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded San Francisco State a $50,000 planning grant to develop a Pacific Regional Humanities Center. San Francisco State is the only institution in the Pacific Region to receive such a grant, which has been augmented with funds from the University administration.

The grant, one of 16 awarded nationwide so far, is the first step in creating a center to study local history, peoples, cultures, languages, landscape, and architecture. The Pacific Region, which spans 10 million square miles, includes California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, and Hawaii, along with the territories of American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Marianas. Ten centers will be established throughout the U.S.

The planning grant funds will be used, among other purposes, to set up a communications center that will allow users throughout the far-flung region to meet electronically, via the World Wide Web, and to make connections with existing regional resource centers.

The centers will provide opportunities for individuals and institutions to collaborate with other cultural institutions in their regions, support research on regional topics, document regional history, preserve cultural resources, develop learning opportunities for grades K-12, build college-level degree programs in regional studies, and foster cultural tourism.

"This grant recognizes San Francisco State's leadership in regional studies," noted Dr. Lee Davis, who heads the planning team. "We were the first university to establish a California studies minor, and we have the whole-hearted support of the University administration to develop a program that covers the entire region.

"San Francisco itself is a wonderful location for a center because its history-the Gold Rush and the shipping trade, for instance-and its status as a port of entry for immigrant groups connects it to nearly every other part of the region," she continued.

Within the next two years, the SFSU planning team will work with advisors from the region's states and territories to develop a plan for the center. Besides Davis, who heads the California Studies program, the planning group consists of Dr. Robert Cherny (History), Associate Vice President Paul Fonteyn, Dean Joel Kassiola (Behavioral and Social Sciences), Dean Nancy McDermid (Humanities), and Dr. Vicki Casella (Center for the Enhancement of Teaching), with other members to be named in the next three months.

The 10 regions are the Pacific, Southwest, Rocky Mountains, Plains, Upper Mississippi Valley, Central, Deep South, South Atlantic, Mid-Atlantic, and New England.

San Francisco State University is a highly diverse community of 27,000 students and 3,500 faculty and staff. It is one of the largest campuses in the nationally recognized 23-campus California State University history.

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