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2005 Teachers Institute set to begin
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Posted on Aug 25 2005
Teachers from Saipan, Rota and Tinian will again have the opportunity to learn about the rich history and cultures of the Northern Mariana Islands during the 2005 Teachers Institute that will begin this weekend.
According to the Council’s executive director, Paz C. Younis, the Institute is an annual program undertaken by the Council in conjunction with the CNMI Public School System and the Northern Marianas College.
This year’s Institute will comprise six eight-hour sessions held on successive Saturdays from Aug. 27 to Oct. 1 It is intended to provide teachers with a detailed overview of NMI history and cultures to K-12 teachers in both the public and private school systems. Teachers from Rota and Tinian will participate remotely via the Public School System’s video teleconferencing facility.
Younis said that the Institute’s first session will feature Dr. Brian Butler, who will cover archaeology and ancient history. Butler, who serves as the director of the Center for Archaeological Investigations at Southern Illinois University, is considered one of the leading experts in Marianas archaeology. He has conducted several major research projects on Saipan, Rota and Aguiguan over the past 25 years and has written widely on the archipelago’s ancient history.
Other sessions, led by local and regional experts, will cover the Spanish Period, Carolinian settlement, the German Period, the Japanese Period, World War II and the U.S. Naval and Trust Territory Periods. The final institute sessions will tackle the status negotiations that led to the establishment of the Commonwealth, the CNMI Constitution and current issues that are affecting life in the Northern Mariana Islands.
The Humanities Council is a private, non-profit corporation whose mission is to support quality humanities programming for the people of the Commonwealth. (PR)
