monday, april 26, 2004
news
the university daily kansar
5A
KU program to discuss effects of expanded EU
By Marc Ingber
minger@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
The European Union is making some new friends.
This weekend's expansion of the European Union will be the topic of conversation at a program put on by the KU Office of International Programs. The program, "Europe at the Crossroads: What EU Enlargement Means for You," will be held today at the KU Edwards Campus in Overland Park and tomorrow in the Kansas Union.
On Saturday, the EU will expand from 15 member nations to 25, the largest expansion in its history. Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia will be added to the EU, which originally started as an economic committee in 1958.
The program will focus on how the expansion will affect European politics, economics, history and culture as well as how it will affect businesses in the United States.
The rules and standards required to be a member of the European Union will make it easier for Kansas City businesses to deal with these new member countries, said Michael Mosser, assistant dean of the graduate school and international programs.
"Instead of dealing with 10 sets
of economic laws, they will just have to deal with one," he said.
Mosser said the expansion would give Kansas City businesses increased opportunities to do business in Europe. The regulations will make companies more willing to tap into these countries' markets, which have about 100 million consumers, he said.
summers, he said.
What might be good for businesses in the United States could spell doom for businesses in the new member countries, said Viktoria Bagi, a Miskole, Hungary, graduate teaching assistant in Germanic Languages and Literature. She said businesses in her home country would have to learn new standards, languages and processes for doing business with other countries.
"Those who can't keep up with it will fail," she said.
Andrea Nemedi, a Szeged, Hungary, GTA in Germanic Languages and Literature, said becoming a member would pay off over time because of the financial support the organization could provide.
organization could provide "In the long run, the membership will bring development and possibilities for Hungary that would not be possible outside of the EU," she said.
Becoming a member of the European Union will bring social changes to the new countries, but they will be gradual, Nemedi said.
European Union The Office of International Programs will hold "Europe at the Crossroads: What EU Enlargement Means For You" today and tomorrow. On Saturday, the EU will add 10 new countries, bringing it to a total of 25.
Today: 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Room 208 of the Regents Center at the KU Edwards Campus in Overland Park
Tomorrow: Noon to 5:45 p.m.
at the Kansas Union and 6
p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Mex Kade
Center, 1134 West 11th St. in
the Sudler House, campus
annex 101
Source: www.international.ku.edu
"On the first of May, Hungary will become an official member, but the life in Hungary will not be changed in a day," she said.
Bagi said the European Union was the most important organization in Europe and that it was becoming necessary for countries to join it.
to join it.
"The good thing is that all these countries wouldn't be able to stand up for their interests as successfully if they weren't in the EU," she said.
Edited by Meghan Brune
I know it's only rock 'n' roll...
Dethro Tull, lead singer and guitarist for Ike Turner Overdrive, fell to his knees during the band's Farmer's Ball performance on Saturday night at the Jackpot Saloon. The band participated in the finals of KJHK's annual competition.
CLUB: KU Lion's Club member encourages others to volunteer
CONTINUED FROM 1A
alone what it did.
Folks has her reasons for starting the club. She's working toward a leadership minor and she needs the community service hours to graduate.
But she has other reasons, too. Reasons her family instilled in her. Reasons her friends helped foster when she was growing up in Eudora.
"The way I grew up, it showed me how to help people. I know it's not about the money." Folks said. "It's about something else."
Never Doing Enough
When Folks was a child, her mother worked in social work at a family preservation organization. She volunteered for Good Samaritan projects. She took her children to soup kitchens to volunteer on the holidays.
There, Folks, her brother, Mike, and her sister, Aubry, fed people who couldn't feed themselves.
"The way I grew up, it showed me how to help people. I know it's not about the money. It's about something else."
Diana Folks Eudora senior
Folks could see why her mother, who worked for years in social service, preached helping those who didn't have as much as they did.
"She modeled that kind of behavior for us," she said.
Folks felt good. She liked to help people. But there was a pit in her stomach, a feeling she couldn't shake.
"It almost feels like you're never doing enough," she said.
As Folks grew up, she wanted to do more. She wanted to give more than she had given before, to feel like she was doing enough.
But Eudora is a small town. Sometimes, Folks said, it's almost impossible to find enough to do in small towns. So Folks and some friends from high school created ways to help people. They asked for coats to donate. They cooked food to hand out.
Opportunities were still limited. Folks said, because they didn't have the contact with organizations that had the resources to reach out to people.
When she reached the University as a freshman, she felt like the world had opened up to her.
"We can do what we want on a broader scale now," Folks said. "There are people with more creativity, and more opportunities."
This semester, she has volunteered at Audio Reader, where volunteers read to the blind and physically disabled. At Big Brothers and Big Sisters, she mentored children who didn't have anyone else to teach them about life.
Now, she'll take all of her history — her work, her experience.
her mom's experience — and apply it to a club that just six months ago, she never considered working with.
Struggle to Volunteer
Here's what Miller gave Folks when Folks asked for help finding an organization to work for: an answer Folks never expected.
"I had worked with the Lion's Club for years," Miller said. "I thought she might be interested in that."
After searching weeks for volunteer work with no success, Folks was willing to try anything.
Folks was willing to try anything. When an individual looks for volunteer work, Miller said, the process can become arduous. Folks called organization after organization.
Some turned her away because Folks' schedule wouldn't work for the organization. Some required long training periods, something Folks didn't have time for.
"She was lost in the shuffle with other organizations," Miller said.
It's much easier, Miller said, for large groups such as sororities and fraternities to volunteer, because they can train among themselves and can work around scheduling issues.
"It's hard to find leadership opportunities outside of sororities." Miller said.
Many fraternities and sororities have specific volunteer organizations they work with. Folks said, so those doors are often closed to people outside of the greek community.
Folks decided not to work within the greek system. When she asked Miller for help, Miller suggested an organization she had worked with for years. And, after years of struggling, the organization had launched a new campaign to attract college students.
At major universities across the country, such as the University of Nebraska, college branches of the Lion's Club have found new life, filling gaps in service that other organizations didn't cover.
The Lion's Club seemed perfect
for Folks. Volunteers worked with the blind, doing many of the same things Folks did at Audio Reader
Now, Folks is ready to stop recruiting and start putting the club to work.
This year, the club will build homes with Habitat for Humanity. It will work with Cottonwood Inc. spending time with mentally disabled adults at parks and stores downtown. But that's just this year.
this year. "The projects that this group do are really limitless," Miller said.
Folks will likely finish this semester with enough community service hours to graduate.
Folks knows she can't volunteer for a living — another lesson she learned from her mother. After graduation, she said she would work in sales. But Folks said that kind of work would always fall short of what she got from helping people.
"There are benefits. Emotional benefits," she said. "That's all there is in this kind of work."
— Edited by Collin LaJoie
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