Budding business students visit from Romania
By John Temple Ligon
Temple@TheColumbiaStar.com

Emilia-Alina Otezan, City of Cluj; Michaela Sinca, teacher; Lucia Maria Lungu, teacher; Ana Daniela Ladariu, teacher; Rodica Doina Iancau, teacher; Alexandra Columban, student; Radu Garbovan, student; Miruna Magdas, student; Bigi Maria, student; Georgian Cocis, student; Cristina Lupea, archicture student; Adriana Michaela Vuscan, teacher; and Gabriella Lucia Wainblat, teacher.

Last week eight Romanian high school students and their seven teachers discussed their 2006 Global Issues English Immersion Camp. Escorting the group were their international relations officer and their official interpreter. Their visit to Columbia was partially funded by the State Department in Washington. The balance of the sponsorship was shared by the Moore School of Business and The Columbia World Affairs Council.

Dr. Carolyn Jones, head of the undergraduate program at USC's Moore School of Business, conceived the idea of a service learning project that would create an opportunity for undergraduate business students to introduce business skills and cross-cultural communication to high school students in emerging democracies.

In the summer of 2004, 13 USC students and six staff members traveled to Cluj-Napoca, Columbia's Sister City in Romania. Seven local high schools in the Cluj metropolitan area participated.

In the winter and spring of 2005, Emilia-Alina Lup, dispatched from the mayor's office in Cluj, visited Columbia to observe business incubator operations and other economic expansion practices. Working with the director of USC's business incubator, Joel Stevenson, the City of Cluj has developed two business incubators.

In July 2005, eight students and Dr. Kristia Finnigan from USC's College of Arts & Sciences joined faculty members and eight students from the Moore School of Business for the trip to Cluj. During the 2005 student camp, three seminars for the participating Romanian high school English teachers were offered by USC instructional team members: (1) PPT Instruction, (2) Shared Perspectives on European Politics, (3) Entrepreneurship.

Ongoing is a book drive, a donation of books in English sent to Cluj. Thanks to the Moore School's Undergraduate Student Leadership Council, about 1,000 books were collected and shipped. A parallel activity by Columbia-area high schools is under way. A.C. Flora held the first high school book drive and collected another 1,000 books.

While visiting Columbia, the Romanian students and their teachers are guests in the homes of generous Columbia families for the week.

Coming from a country of 23 million people, almost 90% ethnic Romanian, the business students are here for not only total language immersion but for the full American cultural and demographic exposure, too. Romania emerged in late 1989 after 45 years of Communist rule. Columbia's visiting Romanian students' average age is 17, making them the first to

live entirely in the new regime beyond the influence of the Soviet bloc.

The Romanians have learned from us, both our successes and our mistakes. For instance, their corporate tax rate is 16% countrywide, while here in the USA we pay 35% to the federal government and a little more to the state government and sometimes even a little more to the municipal government. The Romanians impose a value-added tax of 19% on their goods, which can be considered a consumption tax and can be considered a personal income tax relief feature.

Their recent rate of inflation at 5% is a bit above ours, and they have fears for their environment as the economy expands, just like we do. For the past three years, their annual growth rate in the Romanian gross domestic product has been running above 6%, while the GDP growth rate in the U.S. has been about one-third less.

To contribute books or to offer housing accommodations for next year, call Leigh Stevenson at the Moore School of Business, 777-2191, or call Haneez Zattam at the World Affairs Council, 252-2197.