Efforts are accelerating at the University of North Dakota to promote undergraduate study, graduate education, graduate student exchanges, and faculty research collaborations for Sri Lankans in Grand Forks, North Dakota, with the Geography faculty members at this American institution of higher education. Such activity is the product in part of implementing the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed by representatives of the Department of Geography, University of Peradeniya (UOP) (Sri Lanka) and the Department of Geography at the University of North Dakota (UND) (USA) on November 5, 2009.

Visit of Assoc. Provost Dr. V. Beard (centre) with Prof. V. Nandakumar (left) and Dr. D. Munski (right) in the B.L. Wills Room in the Department of Geography at UND on November 16, 2009. Please note the Sri Lankan artefacts in the background which includes the Sri Lankan flag, a special wood carving in the shape of the island of Ceylon, and a wonderful Noritake tea set given as a gift to the American geographers by their Sri Lankan colleagues.

That particular document would not have been possible were it not for the work of Priyanthi Dissanayake www.scholarshipsforusa.com , UND's exclusive representative in Sri Lanka, in bringing together the chairpersons of the respective Geography Departments (Prof. V. Nandakumar of UOP and Dr. B. Rundquist of UND) with arrangements at the Grand Forks campus being handled by Dr. D. Munski, the graduate director for the UND Department of Geography.

Currently, a full graduate tuition waiver has been put aside for the first Sri Lankan to pursue either an M.S. or M.A. degree in Geography at the Grand Forks campus. As noted by UND's Geography department's chairperson, Dr. Rundquist, such an individual would be eligible for additional funding, if qualified, as a graduate teaching assistant, graduate research assistant, or graduate service assistant. Presently, several opportunities exist for a person to work in a wide range of laboratories and lecture-discussion courses handled by the seven faculty members at the Grand Forks campus. A person interested in physical geography and geospatial techniques would best be advised by Dr. Rundquist for topics in remote sensing and biogeography, by Dr. P. Todhunter for theses on issues of natural hazards and climatology, or by Dr. G. Vandeberg for topics in geomorphology and resource management.

A person interested in human geography and geospatial techniques would best be working on thesis topics on population geography and community development with Dr. D. Hansen, on research materials in economic geography and globalization with Dr. E. Wang, and on thesis topics in urban geography and qualitative geographic information systems with Dr. J. Jung. Prospective students of geographic education or historical geography would be encouraged to work with Dr. Munski. Facilities for the UND Department of Geography are housed in the O'Kelly Hall/Ireland Hall complex in the centre of the campus.

Conveniently situated across the main quadrangle from the Chester Fritz Library and only across the street from the UND Student Memorial Union, undergraduate geography majors and geography graduate students enjoy a highly advantageous location relative to campus life and activity. Just on the other side of the UND Student Memorial Union is the UND International Centre, a student services facility with personnel dedicated to helping students from around the world succeed at this American institution of higher education. Although the Sri Lankan community is small in comparison to other South Asian populations on the Grand Forks, the Lankans who are here are sufficiently active to have offered Sri Lanka Night on February 4, 2010 to a campus-wide audience that filled to overflowing the space being used in the UND Student Memorial Union.

In addition to good academic facilities and places for social interaction, UND Housing has a set of options for living quarters that ranges from sleeping rooms with kitchen privileges to efficiency apartments to two-bedroom/three-bedroom apartments on campus. Shuttle buses operate on-campus and connections to other parts of the community are available through the city transit system, Travel outside the city limits does emphasize automobile usage, but there is sufficient airline operations and limited passenger rail service available for regional travel. It should be noted that Grand Forks is situated only 2.5 hours south of Winnipeg, Manitoba, one of the most ethnically diverse major metropolitan centres of Canada, and only 5 hours northwest of Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, one of the key international airline hubs and sub-national metropolitan areas of the central parts of the United States.

Sri Lankans will discover that coming to this particular United States institution of higher education with approximately 12,500 students and located in a community of 55,000 in the Red River Valley of the North is going to be quite different from being at an American university on the East Coast or the West Coast or the Gulf Coast of the United States. The pace of life is slower, but not too slow because of the great variety of entertainments both indoor and outdoor that are available to undergraduates and graduate students. It is more a "small town America" in a challenging physical environment in a mainly rural part of the Upper Middle West. While mid-December through early March may be a time of exceedingly cold temperatures and some major snowfalls, the scholars and citizens of this North Dakota community will embrace their Sri Lankan students and colleagues warmly and take excellent care of them.

Efforts continue in recruiting for the first sponsored and funded Sri Lankan M.A. or M.S. graduate student in Geography for the Grand Forks campus. Inquiries regarding the latter in Sri Lanka should be directed to Priyanthi Dissanayake, www.scholarshipsforusa.com . Information about the former activity will be forthcoming from Dr. D. Munski. Formal applications must be made through the UND Graduate School and done electronically. Meanwhile, prospective undergraduate and graduate applicants for the UND Department of Geography are encouraged to take a virtual visit to the Grand Forks campus by using this URL on the Internet:

http://www.und.edu/dept/Geog/mainpage.htm