UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — A first-ever trip to Bulgaria, a trip to the emerging and vibrant country of Kazakhstan, and a trip to Mexico that leans heavily into collaboration with educators and filmmakers in that country offer important hands-on opportunities for Penn State communications students during the University’s upcoming spring break, March 10-14.
Bulgaria, media studies
Martin Marinos, an assistant professor of film production and media studies in the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications, selected Bulgaria as the destination for his world media systems class because of his connections to southeastern Europe, as well as the potential value of the trip for students.
“It’s an opportunity to experience a different culture and learn about the media landscape there. A trip like this has so many aspects that touch on culture, history and geography, as well as international travel and politics,” said Marinos, who started planning the trip eight months ago. “It’s a great location that’s a little more unconventional, rather than a tourist destination.”
Students in his class come from different backgrounds, and even different countries.
As Marinos offers “a buffet” of information about media systems across the world during the semester, he said the group’s commitment to the trip has been evident from the start. He believes it’s a focused group, and while some have traveled extensively, others will be making their first trip outside of the United States.
Marinos said the trip has the potential to be a success on several levels. First, just by making an international trip, students can gain an understanding of things they would have no other way to experience.
“A trip like this can be important in the short term, maybe looking at just this semester and their worldview, and it can have a longer-lasting impact, offering context for things that will happen later in their careers or lives,” he said.
Marinos and the students will be joined by Sara Liao, an assistant professor of media studies, who led the department's embedded trip last year.
The Bellisario College’s three “embedded courses” making spring break trips are structured to include several weeks of study at the start of the semester, a spring break trip, and then several more weeks of study.
Kazakhstan, journalism
Students in the international reporting course led by Katie O’Toole, an assistant teaching professor of journalism, will visit Kazakhstan, which has become popular and prosperous in part because of its location in central Asia, between Europe and China.
The traveling team will be based in the country’s largest city, Almaty, with students planning stories on the country’s geopolitical importance, the active community of Uyghurs (many refugees from China), the importance of glaciers and the water supply, and even a potential sports story about the indigenous sport of kokpar.
“I enjoy being able to travel as a journalist. You get access and people open their doors. It’s exciting and interesting,” O’Toole said. “People let you into their lives because they know you’re there to tell a story — their story.”
Four other Penn State faculty and staff members will accompany O’Toole and the students.
Bellisario College adviser Del Schwab previously lived in Kazakhstan. He and Mila Sanina, an assistant teaching professor, will serve as translators. In addition, Steve Kraycik, an assistant teaching professor, and Shaheen Pasha, an associate teaching professor who has 20 years of international journalism experience, have traveled on trips with Penn State students in the past.
Students will conduct interviews and gather information during the trip, sharing some of their work while on site and pulling together even more, including a television news special, once they return.
Mexico City, film production
Like the international reporting students, students in the international documentary filmmaking course will produce an abundance of content during their trip.
That group, led by Pearl Gluck, an associate professor of film production, is traveling to Mexico City to collaborate with filmmakers at the Facultad de Cine and DocsMX Film Festival to create short documentary films as part of a 100-hour documentary film challenge.
A dozen filmmakers from Mexico City will work the Penn State students, who will be challenged to produce a film during their trip. The students’ ideas for stories include Afro-Latino culture in Mexico, a church that provides shelter for migrants, one of the first women’s softball teams that features a Mexican Olympian, and a halal taco stand opened by a Mexican Christian convert to Islam.
Those diverse ideas excite Gluck as much as the students.
“We are very inspired to put a face on people from Mexico through doc storytelling, especially in this moment in our history,” Gluck said.
Those accompanying Gluck and the students on the trip include Yaw Agawu-Kakraba, a professor of Spanish and African studies from Penn State Altoona, and Roland Ballester, an adjunct lecturer in the Bellisario College who also works as a producer and film producer.
The filmmaking class, like the other international trips, includes several students traveling abroad for the first time.
Ironically, though, the flight to Mexico City will be shorter than the one film production major Charlotte Plemmons used to travel home to California.
“It’s still an exciting opportunity,” said Plemmons, who will be using the passport she got six years ago for the first time. “It’ll be exciting to see another country, and especially to work with other filmmakers on a project.”
She anticipates conducting interviews and shooting six to eight hours of footage during the trip. As part of the 100-hour challenge, Plemmons plans to complete a version of her five- to eight-minute film while in Mexico, and then perhaps “a more polished edit” after the team returns home.
Her potential topic focuses on Mexican street vendors who have dulled the spices in their food because of the growing number of remote workers who have made a home in Mexico City in recent years and who do not have a taste for spicy food.