USDANEWS                                                           VOLUME 58 NO. 9 — DECEMBER 1999

A Global Trip Back, To Train
It’s been a practice in the Foreign Agricultural Service that during summer some of the agency’s foreign service officers and foreign service nationalists temporarily leave their assignments at agricultural posts overseas and come to FAS headquarters in Washington, DC for a few weeks of training and consultations. This September, for the first time, FAS’s corps of seven foreign service administrative assistants also came home for training.

Kathy Ting, a special project officer with FAS’s Foreign Agricultural Affairs program area and coordinator of the week-long training for the seven staffers, said FAS has had foreign service administrative support at many of its overseas offices, or posts, since its inception. “They originally served as confidential assistants,” she noted. “They have since evolved into administrative assistants par excellence.”

“And now, their new responsibilities require some critical training not possible overseas--so they needed to come back to the U.S. to get it.”

The seven FAS foreign service administrative assistants are posted in Beijing, China; Berlin, Germany; Brussels, Belgium; Geneva, Switzerland; Moscow, Russia; Tokyo, Japan; and Vienna, Austria.

But just what do they do, in the process of providing foreign service administrative support to their respective FAS posts?

“Though they continue to have the time-honored diplomatically related responsibilities of organizing events at a post when a high-ranking USDA official visits,” Ting explained, “their responsibilities have expanded to where they now handle the post’s considerable inventory and manage its budget. They also have marketing responsibilities, from procurement for trade shows to assisting at ambassadorial functions that feature U.S. agricultural products. Plus, our foreign service administrative assistants are backups to their respective posts’ foreign service officers.”

Sandy Arbuthnot, FAS’s foreign service administrative assistant in Geneva, noted that part of their week-long training in September included learning the online travel system of the National Finance Center. “Once this program, which is still being tested overseas, becomes operational at posts, it will greatly facilitate the handling of travel vouchers,” she said. “Travelers will no longer have to wait weeks or even months for vouchers to be processed. The vouchers will be done on-line and travel reimbursements will be made electronically within a matter of days.”

Claudine Brenner, FAS’s foreign service administrative assistant in Beijing, said they also received training in USDA’s Micro Purchase Credit Card System. “This will facilitate purchases for our overseas posts,” she noted.

The group also learned more about FAS’s Overseas Property Inventory System, which helps them keep track of a post’s inventory, which includes inventory for staff residences. “As with most computer software,” observed Kathy Larkin-Soane, FAS’s foreign service administrative assistant in Brussels, “you can learn much of the mechanics on your own--but training helps you understand it better.”

To reflect their increasing management responsibilities, the seven also received office management training. “Job responsibilities and positions change daily,” noted Tracy McMackle, the foreign service administrative assistant at FAS’s Berlin post. “But discovering how to resolve various situations and conflicts, and learning more about different characteristics of people, was exceptionally useful.”

“I think we returned to our posts with a sense that we are indeed valued team members,” concluded Brenner.

Like her colleagues, Karen Laughlin, FAS’s foreign service administrative assistant in Vienna, has served virtually her entire career overseas. “This training,” she said, “gave us the chance to talk face-to-face with our colleagues at headquarters--so it enabled us to put a face to the person on the other end of the line when we call HQ.”

A particularly poignant observation, in light of their years served abroad...

--Elaine Protzman

36^th Tree Graces Capitol This Year
“It’s the tallest holiday tree ever to grace the west lawn of the Capitol.”

Eric Gustafson, a project leader with the Forest Service’s North Central Forestry Sciences Laboratory in Rhinelander, Wis., was talking about the 1999 Capitol Holiday Tree, which is now lit and ready for viewing on the lawn of the U.S. Capitol that faces the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. He noted that this year’s tree is a 63-year-old, 11,800-lb., 70-foot white spruce from the North Central Forestry Sciences Lab.

Tim Swedberg, a public affairs specialist with FS’s North Central Research Station in St. Paul, Minn., added that each year one of this country’s 155 national forests provides the Capitol Holiday Tree. “But this year,” he affirmed, “is the first time that the Capitol Tree has come from the Forest Service’s Research Branch.”

“Let’s make this the first official signature on our traveling message that 'Wisconsin’s Forests Are Forever And For Everyone’,” declares Linda Donoghue, director of FS’s North Central Research Station in St. Paul, Minn. She is signing her name to the side of the trailer which is to transport this year’s Capitol Holiday Tree from Rhinelander, Wis., to Washington, DC. Later,...

Beverly Carroll, an FS program analyst and national coordinator for the Capitol Holiday Tree, said that this is the 36^th Capitol Holiday Tree. Of those, 30 have been donated to Congress by the Forest Service, with the support of state and local communities, for use as the Capitol Tree.

...Rita Ronning, an FS secretary with FS’s North Central Research Station and a member of the Lac du Flambeau Band of the Chippewa Indian Nation, sprinkles tobacco leaves into the hole in which the Capitol Holiday Tree (behind her) will stand. This traditional sign of thanks is a custom of the Chippewa Indian Nation. --Photos by Tim Swedberg

“This white spruce started its journey from Wisconsin to Washington, DC, designated as a 'Millennium Tree’,” Swedberg said. On November 11 it was loaded onto a special 90-foot trailer, where it was featured in a statewide whistlestop tour of 32 Wisconsin communities.

On November 29 it then arrived in Washington, DC by train. “That was another first for a Capitol Holiday Tree,” he underscored.

“Throughout that trip,” said Pancho Smith, an FS law enforcement officer on the Superior National Forest in Duluth, Minn., “we nourished the tree’s trunk and limbs with a bath of sugar water twice daily.”

Denver James, FS’s assistant director of conservation education, said that prior to the tree’s departure, thousands of fourth graders around Wisconsin participated in an essay contest, answering the question “If you were the Millennium Tree standing proud and tall before our Nation’s Capitol, what would you tell America about Wisconsin’s forests?” In addition, each fourth- grade classroom in the state was sent a conservation education packet which FS’s North Central Research Station and FS’s Northeastern Area, State and Private Forestry helped to develop as a teaching aid.

Swedberg added that the tree’s journey and related activities were funded through sponsors and donations.

Carroll said that this year’s tree is decorated with over 5,000 ornaments. “They’re all made by Wisconsin residents from natural materials,” she emphasized.

She pointed out that the Capitol Holiday Tree--also called the 'People’s Tree’--is not to be confused with the National Christmas Tree, which is a tree growing on the Ellipse behind the White House.

The 1999 Capitol Holiday Tree, which was formally lit on December 9, will be lit each evening throughout the December holiday season.

--Janine Benyus

Two Welcome Words In Rural U.S.
Mark Seiler has two words he wants to shine a spotlight on: User Friendly.

“That’s because we’ve recently modified and streamlined the Rural Utilities Service’s Distance Learning and Telemedicine Loan and Grant Program to make its application process more user friendly,” he said.

Seiler, an RUS financial analyst, with RUS Distance Learning and Telemedicine Branch Chief Larry Bryant and RUS management analyst MaryPat Daskal, coordinates RUS’s Distance Learning and Telemedicine Loan and Grant Program, or DLT. It is a federal program providing loans and grants to rural areas using telecommunications technology to improve educational and medical services.

“Our overall goal in the changes,” Seiler explained, “was to make the program more responsive to the needs of education and health care providers in rural areas.”

First, RUS clarified and streamlined the DLT application process. “We separated out the rules and requirements for the three DLT programs--loan, loan/grant combination, and grant,” he explained, “so that applicants can better target and make use of the program that best suits their needs.”

Second, RUS expanded the use of DLT loan funds. “It used to be,” Seiler pointed out, “that DLT loan funds were generally only issued for computer hardware and software to support Distance Learning and Telemedicine projects in rural America.”

“But now,” he emphasized, “DLT loan funds can also be used for new building construction, alteration of existing facilities, and even for startup costs, acting as a kick-start.”

Third, RUS widened the scope of the DLT grant program by removing some of the initial grant eligibility qualifications. “Our intent was to ensure a purely competitive DLT grant program,” he said, “so that the best projects receive DLT grant funding.”

Seiler underscored that, in all DLT loan and loan/grant combination funding, applicants may submit their proposals directly to Rural Development state directors or to RUS’s general field representatives for processing. “This provides our applicants with a closer, more localized Rural Development contact for assistance,” he said.

Bobbie Purcell, RUS’s assistant administrator for telecommunications, pointed out that RUS’s Distance Learning and Telemedicine Loan and Grant Program was started in 1993. “As of December 15 of this year,” she said, “it has funded 306 projects in 44 states and two U.S. territories for a total of $83 million.”

In addition, she said, the DLT funding has helped more than 1,200 schools and learning centers provide increased educational opportunities to rural students and residents. Plus, it has improved health care at more than 850 hospitals and rural health care clinics.

“And, because of our 'user friendly’ changes to the application process,” Purcell affirmed, “we expect a better utilization of available funding for projects that will enhance educational opportunities through distance learning networks, provide life-saving medical procedures through telemedicine, and advance rural economic development projects across the nation.” 

--Ron Hall

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