We spent the day exploring Chicago. On our own we went on an adventure: we visited China Town, the artistic part of Chicago and other areas. Chicago is a beautiful city, full of life, energy, young people and has something special. On every corner is something new, so we do six days was not nearly enough to fully meet. We agreed that we will be back someday. In the end, I want to thank everyone who made it possible to realize this unforgettable experience: the administrations of faculties and students from DePaul University in Chicago, Central Florida in Orlando and the Faculty of organization and informatics University of Zagreb and their leaders - Dr. Luciano Berardi and Brian spittle, McNair and A. Mithchem F., De Pual University Chicago, Michael Jeffries Aldarondo with McNair University of Central Florida in Orlando and others. Fabrizio Balcazar from the University of Chicago.
Friday was a day to Friday was a day to visit the Croatian consulate in Chicago. We warmly welcomed by the Consul General Ph.D. Jelena Grcic Polic. After a presentation and exchange of first impressions in Chicago, the conversation was focused on the connections University of Zagreb and DePaul. We concluded that the existing relashionship is strong enough, but in the future they can be further strengthened in order to be exchanged include other communities from the American continent and Croatia. Lots of ideas, such as linking with schools in which we can introduce Croatian customs, then connect to various contacts throughout our beautiful country, which have a link in Chicago - University of Rijeka and University of Dubrovnik will enable even better cooperation in the coming years. We agreed that the importance of this kind of international exchange invaluable because in addition to the research work includes exploring the culture and customs of the host country.
On Thursday at FOI was held 8th Day of international cooperation in which we should participate in Skype meeting , but due to technical difficulties we recorded a video with American students. This was followed by a staff meeting at DePaul, in downtown Chicago. An interesting discussion, exchange of experience, relaxed atmosphere, and the main topic was the education system in the Republic of Croatia and the United States. After the end of the meeting we went to explore Chicago from the tourist perspective. We visited Lake Michigan, Wills Tower and enjoyed the company of American students.
Wednesday - a day for a visit to the University of Chicago. We visited Northwestern University, which is located just outside of Chicago. Beautiful view of Lake Michigan. We had the opportunity together with the students who are part of DePaul McNair program to learn more about the life of the candidate, prcesu applying for doctoral studies, the choice of mentors, thesis topic and the like. Very instructive and interesting.
In the afternoon we visited the University of Illinois Chicago. There are prof. Vidaček and colleague Tadija Bagaric had presentations related to persons with disabilities and their status in Varazdin County. To all the participants was very interesting to hear about the good Croatian practice and efforts made to people with disabilities integrate into society. The discussion after the presentations allowed us to get to know the situation in America.
