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In 2012, Helo Oidjärv, associate professor of social work, went home to Estonia to visit her parents. While there, she had a few preliminary meetings with social workers at the Tartu city government, and worked with them to develop a 3-4-week program to learn about the social welfare system in Estonia, based on that in Tartu. “Estonia has a totally different kind of social welfare system than the U.S.,” Oidjärv points out. “I thought it could be helpful for my students to experience and learn about the various agencies there, to get a broad overview of what different aspects of social policy look like in Estonia and compare it to what they’re used to experiencing in the U.S.”At the time, Oidjärv was teaching social work at Walla Walla University (College Place, Washington), and implemented the program as part of the university’s graduate social work field practicum. Now that she is teaching social work at Pacific Union College, the program has been slightly adapted and has become part of PUC’s social work program as their Global Social Work study tour.The previous teacher of Global Social Work at PUC had taken students to visit an organization in India that helped women transition...

Pacific Union College announced today that they rank second on PayScale’s 2018-19 ranking of associate degree schools which provide the best return on investment after graduation."We are proud of our A.S. students, who are attaining a well-deserved return on their investment with Pacific Union College,” says Nancy Lecourt, academic dean at PUC. “Our professors are clearly preparing them well for meaningful and rewarding service.”PayScale, Inc., is the world’s leading provider of on-demand compensation data and software. This year’s annual College Salary Report included over 200 additional schools from previous years. PayScale’s 2018 report provides estimates of early and mid-career pay for nearly 2,700 associate and bachelor’s degree-granting institutions throughout the U.S., including 1,655 schools providing only bachelor’s degrees—the category in which PUC falls.“For associate degrees, nursing and healthcare provide the biggest payoff for graduates at half the cost of a four-year institution,” PayScale indicates in their release of the report. “For four-year institutions, it pays to attend a private school, as seven out of ten of the top ten schools are private institutions.”For more information about PayScale’s rankings, or to view the complete list, visit their website. For more information about two-year programs at PUC, visit puc.edu/academics/degrees-programs....

Adventist Colleges Abroad (ACA) currently maintains 11 campuses around the world, in Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. Last spring, Sylvia Rasi Gregorutti, chair of the department of world languages and cultures, ACA board member and ACA representative at PUC, received an invitation from the organization to serve as a consultant for their new campus in Brazil.“In an effort to provide a better environment for students in the ACA-Brazil program,” explains Gregorutti, “the organization voted to transfer the campus from the large Universidade Adventista de São Paolo (UNASP) in Southern Brazil to the Faculdade Adventista de Bahia (FADBA), a smaller school in northern Brazil, about two hours from Salvador in the state of Bahia. That’s like moving it from Chicago to New Orleans. Culturally and weather-wise, it’s a major change.” The shift to Bahia will offer ACA students greater engagement with not only their classmates and professors, but also with the local culture and people.In order to fill her consultant role, Gregorutti was told she would need to complete the full six-week ACA -Brazil student program on the new Bahia campus. She agreed with the condition that her 13-year-old daughter come along. “I was student and consultant at...

It started as a conversation between senior biology majors one day during class. Aimee Wyrick, chair of the department of biology and the class’ professor, put down her lecture notes and looked each student in the eye. “Forget today’s lecture,” Wyrick told the class. “Today I want to hear from you and learn from your experiences. What can we do to make the biology program better?”As the laptops closed and notebooks dropped into backpacks, the students began to share. It became clear after a few students spoke that a common thread was the struggle as freshmen to navigate classes and post-college plans.“College can be complicated, even for the smartest student,” says Sabrina Mostoufi, 2018 biology graduate, who was part of the brainstorming class. “We all realized we’d had similar struggles navigating classes and post-college plans, even into our second and third years. This led us to the idea that it would be helpful if older students could act as mentors to freshmen to help point them in the right direction as they’re starting out in college.”The hour-long brainstorm session was eye-opening, revelatory, and productive. At the end of the day, Wyrick was convinced a biology major mentorship program was both...

The Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) Senior College and University Commission (WSCUC) has reaffirmed another eight years of accreditation for Pacific Union College, affirming that PUC has met the Commission’s high standards of quality and effectiveness.“We are very pleased at the outcome of the reaffirmation of our accreditation,” President Robert Cushman said. “Maintaining accreditation is incredibly important, as it validates that we are creatingthe bestpossiblelearning environmentforourstudentstoachievetheireducationalgoals.”The announcement comes after the Commission evaluated the College’s institutional report and conducted a three-day on-site review in April 2018.“Our long relationship with WASC—we were first accredited in 1951—continues to strengthen the academic program and reaffirm our commitment to student success,” adds Vice President for Academic Administration, Nancy Lecourt. In its official action letter, the Commission noted it was particularly impressed with the College’s commitment to its mission and purpose. Commissioners acknowledged the collaborative process in the development of the College’s new strategic plan, which will be launched this Fall."We are quite pleased with the affirmation of our mission and ongoing support for the future of PUC,” said Cushman. “The reaccreditation honors the hard work and exceptional efforts of our PUC faculty and staff.” “We have more work to do in in the...