Thursday, October 4, 2001

Congress begins Monday
Student conference to discuss international
relations on schedule, despite contribution cuts
By Erin LaMourie
Staff Reporter

The second annual American Airlines Leadership for the Americas Congress scheduled to begin Monday at TCU will not be affected by the airline’s decision to stop cash contributions to non-profit organizations, said Kathy Andersen, an AMR/American Airlines Foundation administrator Wednesday.

“We have a three-year commitment to TCU that will be fulfilled,” Andersen said. “The payment for that is completed.”

A $600,000 grant was given to the program November 1999 to fund travel, meals, and all other expenses for three years, said Rebecka Tucker, coordinator for the Leadership of the Americas Program.

The leadership congress will meet at TCU Oct. 8 through Oct. 12 with 55 student representatives from 11 universities, Tucker said. Students represent universities in Canada, Mexico, Costa Rica, Puerto Rico, Peru, Venezuela, Colombia, Brazil, Chile and Argentina, Tucker said.

American Airlines decided to halt charitable contributions last week after 20,000 employees were laid off, in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

Andersen said she does not know if American Airlines will continue to sponsor the program after the remaining grant money is used next year.

“It is very difficult to predict what the future will be,” Andersen said. “It is a valued partnership and hopefully it will be continued.”

This year’s topics are education, the environment, sustainable development and science and technology, Tucker said.

Tucker said the program leaders originally thought the war on terrorism would be important to discuss, but later decided against it.

“The more we thought about it, we did not want to bring this issue to the forefront right away because then we thought it would overwhelm our discussion and (the representatives) have worked for almost a year on these topics,” Tucker said.

All representatives will sign a declaration against terrorism in a session on Friday, and the Nobel Laureates may address the declaration when they speak Thursday night in Ed Landreth Hall, Tucker said.

Tucker said TCU representatives were selected by faculty nominations and an application process. TCU students attending the conference are Alonso Sanchez, a senior math major; Veronica Peña, a senior coordinated dietetics major; Nelson Sosa, a senior management major; Molly Stone, a senior Spanish and English major; and Maria Yabrudy, a senior economics and French major.

Stone and Peña are the only TCU representatives from the United States and the other three students are from other countries. Representatives are required to be fluent in Spanish in English, Stone said.

Stone said she has been preparing her paper on education for the entire semester.

She and the other students will miss classes all next week for the events, she said.

Larry Adams, associate provost for academic affairs, created the idea for the program several years ago to let students discuss different topics every year with students from the Americas.

Last year, the first leadership congress was held at the Universidad de las Americas in Puebla, Mexico.

Erin LaMourie
e.m.lamourie@student.tcu.edu