Public Seminars Focus on Educational Issues in Japan and U.S.

PULLMAN, Wash. — Japanese and American educators will discuss important current issues facing
schools in both countries at a series of four public seminars set for Oct. 19 and 20, sponsored by
Washington State University’s College of Education. Anyone interested in educational issues is invited to
attend the four seminars, said Donald B. Reed, chair of the Department of Educational Leadership and
Counseling Psychology and coordinator of the program committee.
The Japanese educators speaking at the seminars are members of a delegation of eight K-12 educators
from Nishinomiya, a Spokane-sized city near Osaka, who are visiting Pullman as part of a cross-cultural
partnership established in 1987. The partnership, between the WSU College of Education and the
Nishinomiya School District, is the first and only collaborative relationship established between an
American education college and a Japanese school district.
The first seminar will examine teacher development in both countries and will be held in Room 353,
Cleveland Hall on the WSU campus from 4-5:30 p.m., Oct. 19. The seminar will include presentations from
Shizuka Nakamura, principal of Nishinomiya-Higashi High School, and Bonnie Svingen, a teacher at
Pullman’s Lincoln Middle School.
The second seminar will focus on moral issues in education and will be in Room 160A, Cleveland Hall,
also from 4-5:30 p.m., Oct. 19. The seminar will include presentations from Gail Furman-Brown, education
professor from WSU Tri-Cities, and Katsuko Mese, principal of Takagi Elementary School in
Nishinomiya.
The third seminar examines student discipline and will be in Room 353, Cleveland Hall from 4-5:30
p.m., Oct. 20. The seminar will include presentations from Tariq Akmal, assistant professor of education at
WSU, and Muneya Matsumoto, principal of Fakazu Junior High School in Nishinomiya.
The fourth seminar focuses on special education and will be in Room 160A, Cleveland Hall, also from
4-5:30 p.m., Oct. 20. The seminar will include presentations from Susan Banks, assistant professor of
education at WSU, and Shuichiro Sakai, assistant chief of the Nishinomiya School Education Department.
The Nishinomiya delegation is visiting K-12 classrooms in Pullman and at WSU Vancouver, and
holding seminars for American educators during the week-long annual exchange visit that ends Oct. 21.
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