Forsyth assists students in going places
The pre-departure handbook for outgoing students of Utah State University reads, “Those who visit foreign nations but associate only with their own countrymen, change their climate but not their costumes; and with their heads as empty as their pockets, return home with traveled bodies but unraveled minds.”
Kay Forsyth, director of Study Abroad, helps students prepare and gain an open mind and willingness to learn about other cultures and not merely change the environment they are living in.
Forsyth is the adviser for students interested in studying abroad. She helps the international students who come to Utah State University on exchange programs and in developing new international partner relationships. She also works directly with different partner schools and overseas transferring credit for students who study abroad.
Forsyth has served as adviser for the newly forming International Cultural Exchange Club (ICE) of returning study abroad students, current international exchange students and prospective students. The idea is to have activities highlighting interest in international groups and is open to anyone interested in such a theme.
Forsyth earned her master’s degree from Ohio State University in social work, and did her undergraduate work in social work and sociology. She started at USU in 1990 at the Center for Persons with Disabilities. She had a research grant to work with low-income families with young children. When the grant project ended in 1998, she took over the position of director for Study Abroad.
She has helped with new partner agreements with schools in Northampton, England; Valparaiso, Chile; Lubjlana, Slovenia; and Innsbruck, Austria.
She is also involved in Cache Valley’s folk dancing schedule. Forsyth said she encourages international students to attend as an opportunity to learn about America’s dance and cultural habits.
She has been a volunteer with the Community University Friends of Foreign Students committee through the International Student Scholar Office. She met her husband, Al when she was on a tour of Europe as a college student abroad. They met in Amsterdam and they continue to travel abroad with her family. Forsyth has also enjoyed hosting international students in her home.
Forsyth’s family is actively involved in welcoming the exchange students to the states. She said she has hosted students for Thanksgiving and Halloween get-togethers. The Halloween party is a point of interest for the students because pumpkin carving is a particularly peculiar activity.
“It’s kind a bizarre for them. They can’t understand why we are cutting up food,” Al said.
He said part of her job is to introduce students to American customs. Students usually come from more urban areas than Logan so the Forsyths often take students down to Salt Lake City to do some shopping and enjoy the city.
“One student from India helped my daughter learn how to ride a two wheel bike,” Forsyth said. “He would, with great patience, hold the back of the bike and run around with her in the cul-de-sac so she could begin to get her balance.”
Many of the returned Study Abroad and international exchange students keep in touch with Forsyth after their program is over.
“One international student, after arriving here at USU got in so late she couldn’t get into a dorm. I invited her to stay at my home. We have been friends ever since, and my family has stayed at her home in France as well,” Forsyth said.
She said she plans activities each semester for the incoming and returning students. Some of those activities include getting lost in the corn maze, carving pumpkins, visiting Hardware Ranch to ride the sleigh and see the elk, and singing national anthems from all over the world in front of a campfire.
“I love my job and learn so much from the students,” she said. “I meet people from USU who expand their horizons by studying abroad and the incoming students from around the world give me hope that by exchanging ideas and learning about other cultures we can, from the ground up, nurture peace throughout the world.”
-kassrobison@cc.usu.edu