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As a Peace Corps volunteer in Bulgaria, Andrea Kruse MAOL '13 created a summer camp for children.

Partners In Peace

When former Peace Corps volunteer Andrea Kruse MAOL '13 was stationed in Dren, Bulgaria, she taught orphans how to speak English and use the computer. She also worked with other Peace Corps volunteers in the country to plan joint educational outings for the children.

Kruse, who hails from Albion, Nebraska, and is St. Catherine University's first Paul D. Coverdell Fellow, says the highpoint of her two-year Peace Corps service was creating a summer camp that introduced children to archaeology and their Bulgarian history.

The Coverdell fellowship program offers "returned" Peace Corp volunteers financial aid, such as scholarships and stipends, and professional internships at more than 70 partner schools. At St. Kate's, Coverdell Fellows receive an award equivalent to approximately $10,500 toward a Master of Arts in Organizational Leadership (MAOL).

Kruse, now a gallery supervisor at the Science Museum of Minnesota, is pursuing the MAOL's strategic management concentration. "I hope to work in international business or with a nongovernmental organization," she says. "And this St. Kate's degree is a good fit." — Pauline Oo

GLOBE-al Influence

This summer, St. Catherine's National Center for STEM Elementary Education will host an international conference designed to inspire educators to include more science, technology, engineering and mathematics–based concepts in their teaching.

The conference, titled "GLOBE and STEM: Building a Global Community of Citizen Scientists," will be held July 15–20 on the University's St. Paul campus. More than 150 participants from around the world will share their successes with colleagues and add the latest innovations in STEM curricula to their professional portfolios.

Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE) is a White House–sponsored science and environmental monitoring initiative. It has evolved into a worldwide, hands-on, school-based program that supports collaborations among students, teachers and scientists in their investigations of the environment and the Earth system.

GLOBE partners include the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Science Foundation and 3M Co.

Since its launch on Earth Day 1995, the program has trained more than 54,000 teachers; 1.5 million students have participated in GLOBE experiments and contributed more than 22 million measurements to the GLOBE database for use in inquiry-based science projects. — Julie Michener