Homestay Information

Keep PTP in Spokane Informed!

The home-stay coordinator would like to know more about all of our delegates. Please update your Personal Information in the OnBoard by March 1, 2011, to give them a better idea of your hobbies, interests, allergies, etc. You host family will find this information valuable when preparing for your visit.

This is something new so I would certainly take a look.

Passport Information

A couple of items in regards to your passports:

1). It is of HIGH importance that I get a copy of your passport, at least one, I can make another. I need to send them into Spokane by March 1. If you did not give me copies at the last meeting please sent them in the mail.

2). If for some reason you do not have your passport yet please e-mail me and let me know so I can pass that information on.

3). Also see the note below regarding passports:

If you or your delegates have not already applied for a passport, we recommend that you apply immediately. We have learned that the processing for passport services could be halted or severely delayed as early as March 4, pending budget approval by the U.S. Congress. You may want to request expedited passport processing, at an additional fee of $60, to ensure the fastest possible return of your passport; you can check current passport processing times here.
If you or your delegates have applied for a passport but not received it yet, it will most likely be processed soon; you can check the status of your application here.
If your delegates already have their passport, please have them log in to OnBoard and add their passport number in their Personal Info under My Account.

NEW! CellHire Scholarship Opportunity:

I believe you all probably received this information but wanted to make sure. Another opportunity, even if it might be a long shot, it might be worth a try. Best of luck. If there is anything I can do to help please let me know.

We are excited to announce a new scholarship sponsored by CellHire – our leader and delegate cell phone provider. Below, please find the overview of this exciting opportunity and make sure to share it with your delegates.

· “Cell Hire-Techno Teen” scholarship

· Available February 18th, deadline March 18th

· More information is coming soon on www.fundingyoureducation.com

· Six-$1,000 scholarships and Smart phone package for program (not to keep)

· Everyone who is enrolled is eligible. No income limit

· Awarded to students who consider themselves a “techno-teen”

· Applying students are to write an essay “How does technology help make you a citizen of the world? Contributing factors: community service, academics

· Winning delegates will update CellHire while on the program documenting their journey for a blog

Here is a little more information that I have received on this scholarship. Have fun!!

In a world growing more and more dependent on telecommunications and social media, you're ahead of the curve. Now it's time to award your tech-savviness. Celebrating five years since they won the coveted Queen's Award for Enterprise and International Trade, our friends and partners at Cellhire®are offering a $1,000 scholarship to six tech-advanced students traveling in 2011. For a scholarship that's worth $1,000, the requirements are simple. All you have to do is send the following to our office: A complete application* (download it from OnBoard) A separate 8 ½ X 11 page listing your honors and activities A copy of your report card A short 500-word essay If you win, you will also receive a free Cellhire Vismo package to use on your program, including a smart phone and internet service plan that keeps you connected anywhere in the world. And because techno teens know how to generate a following, the six award winners will share their Student Ambassador journey through photos, stories, and updates published on the Cellhire blog. 1f U r3@lly r a T3ChN0-T33n, you won't want to miss out on this exciting scholarship opportunity!

Phone Tree On Google

The Phone Tree has just been posted on the Google Sites. I can hardly wait until the next meeting to give it a try. It might be useful for any of our parents that might need to be in contact with each other for some reason. Thank you Phone Tree Committee.

Health Forms Recieved and Sent In

All health forms have been received and sent in. We will now patiently wait and watch to make sure they are all updated on the PTP website. :)

Tasks & Assignments for March 13th Orientation Meeting

• Journal Assignment: Please write your Journal entry in the pre-travel part of your PTP Blue Journal. Topics are listed in another entry on the blog.
• Presentation if you signed up for it in March. If you are worried that it will run you can send it to me and I will make sure it works with my equipment.
• Explore Before You Go - France, all modules
• Read "Destination Overview on France and Switzerland".
• Service Hours: continue to build towards your six and beyond.
• T-Shirt Design - if you are submitting a design, you might consider colors for the t-shirt that might work with your design.
• Money for currency, suggested $150.00
• Rules for the Road: Get off Google Sites, Print, read, sign.
• Other paperwork not turned in last time; will send out the Assignment & Task list again, in a couple of weeks.
• Start walking

Committee Reports: BonVoyage, Reunion, Photography

BonVoyage

The BonVoyage meeting has not yet been set for a date as of yet or location. I will pass along this date as soon as I receive it.


Reunion

The reunion will be held upon our return. A date nor place has been set as of this date. Once again I will let everyone know as soon as I get the information.


Photography

Thank you to this committee for taking pictures at our meetings. Pictures were fun to look at from the first meeting and I am looking forward to ones from our last meeting. The pictures are posted for our 2nd orientation meeting, they are great. Oh, by the way that is on our Facebook page. We will bring our ditital camera to our next meeting since I believe one of our photographers will be absent. If anyone might be interested in taking a few picutures with it we would appreciate it.

Committee Reports: Activity Booklets, Secret Project, Communications, Service Learning

Activity Booklet

Committee is actively putting together information for this booklet. If anyone has any ideas please send them on to anyone on the committee. Committees members are listed on the blog. They were posted earlier.

Secret Project

It is a secret. Make sure you talk to a member of this committee, high importance.


Fundraising

No Report.


Service Learning

We heard from many delegates about the variety of service projects that are being done. Great work. For those of you that shared your projects please document it and bring the slip in next time. The committee is building a database to keep track of volunteer hours/service hours and it would be helpful to have a sheet from everyone on their hours.

Committee Reports: Currency, Food, Phone Tree

Currency Committee:

Money will be collected by the currency committee at either of the next two Orientation Meetings, Orientation Meeting #3 or Orientation Meeting #4. Mrs. Herb indicated that it would not be a problem to get the money exchanged after either of the meetings.

It is up to individual families as to how much money they wish to have up front for travel. The conversion at the present time for #100.00, the Euro would be around 72 Euro. I might suggest $150.00 which would give you closer to 100 Euro to begin with.

I would assume that if you give money to the committee at the 3rd orienation meeting it would be handed out at the 4th orientation meeting and if you brought it in at the 4th meeting it would be handed out at the BonVoyage meeting.

If the committee does not recieve money at either of these meetings, which is fine, each individual will be responsible for getting their own conversion done at their bank.

Food

Thank you, Thank you. The food was great. I actually was able to get something to eat this time.

Phone Tree

I have received the updated phone tree and will post it on Google Sites tonight. If there are any corrections please let Candy Clark know. Her number is on the phone tree.

At our next meeting hopefully we will do a trial run for the phone tree. We are comfortably ahead of the game on this. That is great!

Committee Reports: Offical Visit, Service Learning, T-Shirt

Official Visit

Tyler Olson, a Democrat, will visit us at our April Meeting.

Tyler Olson is the Iowa State Representative from the 38th District. he has served in the Iowa House of Representatives since 2006. He received his BA from Claremont McKenna College and his JD from the University of Iowa College of Law.

Olson currently serves on several committees in the Iowa House - the Economic Growth committee; the Environmental Protection committee; the Ethics committee; the Human Resources committee; and the Ways and Means committee. He also serves as vice chair of the Economic Development Appropriations Subcommitee. his prior political experience includes serving on the Linn County Democratic Central Committee Finance Committee, serving as finance director for Rob Tully for Congress in 1998, and working as assistant finance director for the Democratic Campaign Committee for 1999-2000.

He will speak at the beginning of our meeting, close to 1:00. Please make sure you have a couple of questions to ask. We will have a little time for this.

Service Learning

It was fun hearing what some of you have done for Service Projects. If you did not bring a form completed to our last meeting please bring on filled out to our next meeting. We want to keep track of the number of hours so we can get a total figured out. It will be kind of fun to see how many ours we can end up with.

We will continue to take a little time to share various volunteer projects that you are involved with. It may give other ideas to pursue.

T-Shirt

T-shirt designs may be submitted at the March or April meetings. They can also be faxed to Roger at any time and the he will forward them on. You may also e-mail them to Kathy Litow at (mamacoach@juno.com). :)

Voting will take place at the April meeting. We will also consider color at the same time. The cost for the t-shirts will be around $10.00. Exact costs will be announced when it is set.

The t-shirts will then be distributed at the BonVoyage in May.

Tracy's Huddle Group

Tracy's Square One's

13. Linsey Blair
14. David Mathis
15. McKenna Cole
16. Sam Hansen
17. Whitney Christiansen
18. Ben Dirks
19. Toni Martins
20. Grant Leonard
21. Brennyn Hawbaker
22. Oskar Martin
23. Emily Dye
24. Carissa Siddell

**You will notice that your number has changed. As Tracy and I talked last night we decided that it is easier to have just one number so it stays the same for the small group as well as the larger group. The numbers above reflect this change. Sooo the number above will be your number for your huddle group as well as the delegation number when we count off as a whole delegation.

Roger's Huddle Group

Roger's Angels

1. Ryan Cole
2. Brittany Clark
3. Mitchell Witte
4. Natoshia Kennedy
5. Curtis Litow
6. Liliana Coelho
7. Brian Goodell
8. Alexis Heims
9. Alex Herb
10. Greg Sloan
11. Leah Miller

Presentations on April 10th

1. Brittany Clark - Louvre in France
2. Michelle Grauberger - Crash course in French
3. Emily Dye - Chapel
4. Natoshia Kennedy - Colosseum
5. Carissa Siddell - Trevi Fountain
6. Brennyn Hawbaker - Venice
7. Whitney Christiansen - Italian Fashion
8. David Mathis - Eiffel Tower
9. Greg Sloan - Italian Food
10. Leah Miller - Michelangelo
11. Lexi Heims - Coffee in Italy
12. Mitch Witte - Julius Caesar

Presentations On March 13th

The following ambassadors have chosen to present their information on the 13th of March:

1. Ben Dirks - Pumpkin Seed Oil
2. Grant Leonard - Italian Fashion
3. Sam Hansen -
4. Curtis Litow - French (Need to Know Phrases)
5. Brian Goodell - Mozart
6. Ryan Cole - Mount Vesuvius
7. Lindey Blair - Victor Hugo
8. McKenna Cole - Types of Coffee

Huddle Group Competitions

Here is an update of Huddle Group Competitions:

• Roger's Angels: 0 wins, 1 tie, 1 loss
• The Unnamed: 1 win, 1 tie, 0 losses

This will be updated at the end of our meetings before we take our journey. Friendly competition. Go Roger's Angels, I men The Unnamed.....:)

Congratulations on your win, Unnamed, enjoy you victory.....

Pre-Travel Journal Entry #1

Please select one of the following topics for the first pre-travel journal entry:

• What does it mean to you to be a Student Ambassador? (Include reflection on your understanding of the People to People Mission)
• What does it mean to act "Ambassadorially"?
• What are your goals you have set for yourself by choosing to become a Student Ambassador? (Things like being more open-minded, citizenship skills, specific behavior examples or awareness of a larger world.....)
• What you would like to get out of this journey, give specific examples.

This assignment is due in March at Orientation Meeting #3.