The Hungarian Student, 1957 (1. évfolyam, 2-8. szám)
1957 / 5-6. szám
The Hungarian Student 13 World University Service An International Organization for Mutual Assistance among Universities of the World WHAT WUS IS ^^ORLD UNIVERSITY SERVICE is an international organization dedicated to mutual assistance in meeting the most crucial needs of the university community throughout the world. It offers American students and professors an opportunity for giving to students abroad who are in need and for increasing international understanding both at home and abroad. The WUS effort is rooted in a firm belief that education is the key to many of the world’s problems in both the immediate and the distant future. In the university students of today we have the leaders of tomorow. To guarantee their education is to guarantee a sounder future. The initial program of World University Service, launched after the First World War, provided relief for universities in central and southern Europe. Since that time, the organization has grown into a world-wide operation of students and professors battling against ignorance and need on an international scale. WHAT WUS DOES ABROAD The fight against poverty, hunger, sickness and despair at colleges throughout the world takes different forms in different countries. In Europe, where World War II disrupted lives and weakened the physical and moral fiber of almost every student, WUS offers aid to refugees, provides scholarships, medicines and food, and contributes to the operations of an International Center offering rest cures. It is in Asia today that the need is greatest and help is most necessary. Newly-established nations are desperately in need of skilled technicians. These countries can ill afford the loss of students forced to abandon their studies by ill health, bad housing, or insufficient funds. Throughout Asia, WUS has constructed Student Health Centers and TB sanatoria, stocked libraries and laboratories, established dormitories and provided scholarship and loan funds. In the Middle East, universities fail to meet the demand for trained and enlightened leadership due to lack of funds. Here WUS has helped by building dormitories and sending books and educational equipment. African universities educate pitifully small numbers of students, largely in isolation from the rest of the world. WUS provides scholarships for African students as one means of securing effective, skilled, and friendly future leadership. Books and equipment shipped to many of these centers of learning help to overcome the barriers of isolation. HOW WUS FUNCTIONS ABROAD An international secretariat, with headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, coordinates the work of 39 WUS national branches in the countries of Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, the Far East, and North America. A representative General Assembly meets each year to determine program and policy for the organization. The WUS General Assembly is composed of delegates from countries active in the program of WUS. In addition, there are voting representatives from the major international student religious organizations: Pax Romana-I.M.C.S., the World Union of Jewish Students, and the World’s Student Christian Federation. An Executive Committee, elected by the General Assembly, provides interim direction for the organization between annual Assemblies. WHAT WUS DOES IN THE U.S.A. In the United States, WUS carries on a program that meets national as well as international needs. The WUS Program of Education for International Understanding provides speakers, films, and other materials designed to help campus groups come to a better understanding of the world they live in and of the obligations which they have to this world community. Closely related to the WUS educational program is the fund-raising activity of the organization. More than 600 American colleges and universities conduct annual drives to gather money for the work of WUS. These drives have a beneficial effect upon American, as well as other, students; students at American schools recognize that there are educational needs to be met abroad, and WUS gives them the feeling that they themselves can do something about these needs. In WUS, students find a practical outlet for their altruistic urges by associating themselves with a constructive, positive force which works unselfishly both at home and abroad. Furthermore, students are given an introduction to community participation in philanthropic giving—an experience which helps prepare them for community service in later life. HOW WUS FUNCTIONS IN THE U.S.A. The U.S.A. is divided into seven regions, with headquarters in New York City. Each region is served by a Regional Executive WUS field office. These offices are located in Atlanta, Georgia; Cambridge, Massachusetts; Chicago, Illinois; Dallas, Texas; Los Angeles, California; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Portland, Oregon. Each office assists schools in the region with campus programs of education for international understanding and with fund raising. WHO SPONSORS WUS IN THE U.S.A. WUS in the U.S.A .is a unique federation of Catholic, Jewish, and Protestant student groups. Sponsors and cooperating organizations represented on the General Committee of WUS in the U.S.A. are as follows: the B’nai B’rith Hillel Foundations (Jewish); the Newman Club Federation (Catholic); the United Student Christian Council (Protestant) ; the United States National Student Association (student governments); the Association of International Relations Clubs; the Federation of Jewish Student Organizations of New York; the Institute of International Education; and the Interseminary Movement. NATIONAL OFFICERS OF WUS The national officers of WUS are as follows: President, George N. Shuster, President, Hunter College, N.Y.C.; Chairman, Buell G. Gallagher, President of the College of the City of New York; Vice Chairman, Arthur J. Lelyveld, Executive Director, American Fund for Israel Institutions. ORGANIZATIONS COOPERATING WITH WUS WUS has consultative status with the United Nations as a Non-Governmental Agency. It has cooperating relationships with UNESCO, the United Nations Korean Rehabilitation Administration, the Advisory Committee for Voluntary Foreign Aid, the International Cooperation Administration, the American Committee of Voluntary Agencies for Foreign Service, the Committee for American Remittance Everywhere (Care), the Young Adult Council on Education, the Association of American Colleges, the National Association of Junior Colleges. Other organizations in the academic field have adopted resolutions of support and commendation for the work of WUS.
