Funding is tight and it can be hard to arrange trips abroad to do field or archival research. Once you have a budget and a set schedule, it is imperative that every moment of your trip counts to its fullest. Moreover, careful preparation can also be useful in convincing grant-giving institutions that your project is worth funding. In this meeting moderated by EUCE/ESC Director Ron Linden, a panel of graduate students will share their experiences researching abroad (what worked and what didn’t), answer questions, and offer practical advice.

On January 31, from 8:30am-1:00pm the EUCE/ESC will host an orientation for local high schools competing in the EU Delegation to the US sponsored competition, EURO CHALLENGE. Presenters include: Corrine Tomasi from the University of Pittsburgh, David Anderson from WISE in New York, Stacy Hope from the EU Delegation to the US in Washington, and Robert Schaub from the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, Pittsburgh branch.

From medieval pogroms to modern racial science, Jewish history in Europe has come to stand as a test case for thinking about problems of historical continuity and change, embodied most clearly in the tension between narratives emphasizing a timeless antisemitism and arguments for the distinctive mentalities associated with discrete historical periods.

Julia Schneider, University of Augsburg, will be visiting Pitt the week of March 26, 2012. She will be here the week as a professional development activity and an opportunity to get to know Pitt since we have such an active exchange with Augsburg.

We are planning to have her meet with:

Jennifer creamer, UCIS
John Lyon, German dept
Jeff Whitehead, Study Abroad Office
Michael Rizzi, GSPIA
Lisa Kubic, A&S Graduate Office
Allyson Delnore, EUCE

French Immersion institutes are designed for middle and high school French teachers, as well as French majors to broaden their cultural understanding of current events and international studies regarding French-speaking countries, to strengthen their French listening and speaking skills, and to share strategies for the teaching of French language and culture. We will be offering the following workshop spring, 2012

Topic: "Les Elections Présidentielles et Législatives Françaises de 2012

On January 17th,2012, the European Union Center of Excellence/European Studies Center at the University of Pittsburgh will host an interactive videoconference devoted to the current European financial crisis. To be held from 12-1:30 p.m. in 211 David Lawrence Hall, the session is entitled “Is the Future of the Eurozone the Future of Europe?” This is the first in a series of “Conversations on Europe,” in which participants and audiences will be linked across several sites by video. This first session will feature some of the country’s top experts on the European Union, including Dr.

Professor von Dirke is developing a two-semester course sequence entitled "German for Social Scientists." The first part is largely historical and the second will be more theoretical with a political science/sociology orientation. The course will be pitched to facilitate the transition from third to fourth year language level. It is also designed to allow students to develop the semantic repertoire (specific social science terminology, for example) necessary to read subject-specific academic texts.

Trust in political institutions is one of the key elements which make representative democracies work. Trust creates a connection between citizens and representative political institutions. Democratic governments which enjoy a large degree of trust also tend to have higher degrees of legitimacy and policy efficacy. In Europe's multi-level governance structure, it is imperative to learn more about the determinants of trust in EU institutions. With the increasing salience of EU issues, are domestic proxies still a key determinant of evaluating EU institutions?