Up to 30 students at UW-Eau Claire now have the opportunity to explore the Middle East by living for up to a month in Turkey during summer 2011 through a new program funded partially by the Blugold Commitment.

Paul Kaldjian, associate professor of geography and one of the program’s founders, said a trip like this has been of interest for a while, and through a partnership with the Center for International Education, this trip is now possible.

“For years we’ve been talking about taking students to Turkey, and the Blugold Commitment money created what seems to be sort of the ideal opportunity,” he said.

Kaldjian said the partial funding from the Blugold Commitment will cover all the costs for the three faculty members and give a discount of $800 for each student.

The estimated cost for the program is $2,171 for one credit, $2,447 for two credits, or $2,722 for three credits, which students will have to fund themselves, according to the CIE website. The cost includes tuition, housing, in-country transportation, breakfast and dinner, CISI insurance and administrative fees.

“(The program) can seem expensive, but is actually much less expensive than it would be without the Blugold Commitment,” said Kate Lang, associate professor and chair of the History department. Lang will join Kaldjian and Scott Lowe, professor and chair of the Philosophy and Religious studies department, as one of the three faculty members.

In the first two weeks of the program, students will take intensive language learning classes for two to three hours a day to help them read signs, count numbers and be able to say good morning back to locals, Kaldjian said.

“We are not going to pretend that students are going to learn Turkish,” he said. “But the students will learn formalities, niceties, and they’ll learn things they’ll hear in the streets.”

Senior Lily Budke said if she wasn’t graduating soon, she would be interested in visiting Turkey for the summer.

“I hear that the east of Istanbul is beautiful,” she said. “It seems very exotic and foreign to me.”

Kaldjian said the first two weeks will give the students the opportunity to go and develop a routine in which they will learn how the public transportation works, and to get into some kind of rhythm of daily life.

During the second two weeks, the students will start taking trips to outside of Istanbul. They’ll travel to the capital city Ankara, the historical city of Cappadocia, Konya, a religious center within Turkey, and they will also have a trip to the Black Sea, Kaldjian said.

“We are going to see how parts of Turkey are different from each other,” Lang said. “We will also look at history and culture and the natural environmental of Turkey.”

Prior to the program, Lang said students can expect serious academic work here at the university, where students can take two classes during the spring 2011 semester, which will focus on the geography, history and religion of Turkey.

Lowe said they will stay in inexpensive but safe hotels and hopefully establish home-stay options for students, which Lowe thinks it would be a great experience for them.

Safety shouldn’t be a concern that causes students to second guess the trip, Lowe said, as everywhere in the world has some danger.

“Turkey is a great place to experiment because is relatively safe and you do learn how to conduct yourself properly.”