Excerpts from "KINGDOM WORK"

In conjunction with his theatre internship in Bucureşti, Northwestern senior Kailen Fleck has set up his blog KINGDOM WORK to keep his friends, family, and advisor up-to-date on his activities. The following excerpts are from his September 22 entry entitled "Experiential Education." KINGDOM WORK can be found at the following link, where you'll be able to read more about Kailen's work in the city.
http://kailen-kingdomwork.blogspot.com/

Dear Friend,

Dave Nonnemacher, Northwestern's service learning guru, arrived in Lupeni sometime last week Sunday. As I mentioned in my previous entries, he went with us to the Retezat and made comments about us being a part of the 0.0001% of Americans who had the opportunity to hike in the mountains of Romania. He reminded us of this often. Anyway, he took us out for pizza tonight.

...remember Pizza Planet, the pizza joint we went to a couple of times when we first arrived? That’s where we had pizza with Dave. He wanted to give us some time to vent to him if we had to. We really didn't have to. It also gave him another chance to express how truly passionate he is about this opportunity we each have. I tease Dave about this, but I truly share his passion for the Romania Study Abroad program. The opportunities we have to learn here are invaluable.

Dave spoke a lot about experiential education and how important he feels it is within the context of Northwestern. Let me put my plug in here: if education can be had through experience (isn’t that what most of life is?) then I’m all for it. For crying out loud, Jesus didn’t always teach in a classroom (Sermon on the Mount.) Also, Northwestern continuing their relationship with New Horizons should be obvious. There are opportunities here that you can’t get anywhere else that can benefit everyone involved. I value very much the education I get in the classroom back home, the discussions had with my peers and professors, but experiential education offers something new and different that can still be applied to everyday life. I’m trying to work off of what Dave said, which he says so much better.

Experiential education, adventure education, the Romanian semester, it’s all something Northwestern needs to keep looking into. The work being done here in Lupeni is monumental, and it’s spreading. I’ll be doing very similar work in Bucureşti, work promoting social capital and community, things Northwestern is a large supporter of. This all needs to continue.

I’ve been thinking lately about how I’ll present all this to Northwestern when I return. Part of the internship will be to present my findings, my experiences, wrap it up in a package, and let people know what’s going on. At least, that’s what I want to do when I get back. I have a lot to wrap up. September isn’t over yet, I’ll be in the city, starting my work before the end of the week. Another adventure begins. What will I learn? What will I experience?

Blessings.
Kailen