ATHENS, Ohio (March 15, 2000) -- Ten Ohio University students embark for Europe this week in a first-of-its-kind venture that allows the students to spend spring quarter studying at the University of Leipzig in the former East Germany.

Starting March 20, the inaugural class of undergraduates will participate in a 13-week program at the newly created Ohio-Leipzig European Center in Leipzig, a city of 500,000 people about 100 miles south of Berlin.

"This is the first university center established in a foreign country by Ohio University," said Director of Education Abroad Connie Perdreau. "It is different from our other exchange programs because it is not centered in a single academic department or college. It's open to all majors and fulfills general education requirements."

Students are already applying for a fall quarter program at Leipzig, and Perdreau said she expects the program to expand as more students learn about it. Students completing the program earn 20 hours of credit. To be admitted to the program, students must have at least a 2.25 grade-point average and have completed German 111. Students spend their first three weeks in Leipzig in an intensive German language training program that completes the course requirements for German 112.

"We require it so you can survive," said Cara Pelinsky, study abroad adviser. "We want students to become very involved in the German culture outside the classroom."

Students also take a seminar on Europe since the fall of the Berlin Wall, an introduction to European media, an introduction to European management and various optional courses.

To enhance German language learning and understanding of culture, each student lives with an Ohio University classmate and two students from the University of Leipzig in four-person apartments.

Mark Puskar, a freshman political science major from Beavercreek, Ohio, said the program will allow him to fulfill his goal of studying outside the United States.

"I always thought I'd want to study abroad at some point during college and this program sounded right for me," Puskar said. "I was interested in the fact that the program was in the former East Germany, and Leipzig is one of Europe's emerging major cities."

Although the program is attractive to German majors, Perdreau said it is primarily aimed at freshmen or sophomores from a variety of disciplines who want to experience life in a different culture.

"It's not just for German students or straight-A students or rich students," Perdreau said. "It's for any student with a desire to try something new and study abroad."

For Nathan Chamberlain, a sophomore from Wilmington, Ohio, the opportunity will help him heed the advice of his parents.

"My parents have always encouraged me to seek out and experience new things," Chamberlain said. "It was just weeks before the OLEC program was announced that my father reaffirmed his 'go explore the world' mentality to me. When the opportunity arose for me to take part, I jumped at it."

The relationship between Ohio University and Leipzig dates to 1993, when the U.S. Information Agency provided a grant to the Contemporary History Institute to send professors to Leipzig to teach. At the same time, a grant from the Freedom Forum funded journalism professors' teaching excursions to Leipzig, said Professor of Journalism Robert Stewart, who coordinated the initial faculty exchange programs that also brought Leipzig students to Ohio University.