NORMAL -- Bridging the gap between Muslim and Western points of view was the goal of an international video conference that included a group of Illinois State University students.
In particular, the "America and the World Working Together" conference focused on global poverty, health and hunger issues.
Addressing several U.S. universities and one in Jakarta, Indonesia, ISU senior Dave Currier looked into the camera and shared thoughts on poverty:
"Many Americans don't really take into account what takes place in other parts of the world -- or even here -- until events like the tsunami (in December in the Indian Ocean) or here like Katrina," he said.
But conferences like Tuesday's allow for education between peoples, he said.
Currier said aid can't be the end when it comes to addressing poverty. Instead, he called for developing education and health-care systems that can sustain the aid.
The conference served to promote discussion between college students from differing world views, said Laurie Fraser, an ISU senior from Elgin who organized the event.
She is creating an ISU chapter of Americans for Informed Democracy, a group she came across while studying abroad last year in Freiburg, Germany.
Though it's not yet a registered ISU student group, she hopes to recruit others this fall.
Fraser had planned for a video conference between Iranian and U.S. students, but it was canceled Monday. The democracy group offered the health conference as an alternative, she said.
The international student group -- founded by two U.S. students studying in England on Sept. 11, 2001 -- aims to close the gap between Americans' points of view and how Americans are perceived abroad, she said.
Taking part were students from ISU, Northwestern University in Evanston, Mount Holyoke College in New York; St. Bonaventure in Indiana; Juniata College in Pennsylvania; and Old Dominion University in Virginia.
At the Jarkata campus' turn, the large video projection screen at ISU displayed a classroom on the other side of the globe. There, a dozen women in traditional white head scarves sat at rows of tables, taking turns to speak on the day's topic.
One woman shared the difficulties of obtaining adequate health care, especially in highly industrialized areas and in general following December's devastating tsunami in the region.
About five ISU students made the 8 a.m. meeting at ISU's instructional technology center.
"It's really very good for students to get to see how others in the world perceive U.S. policies," said Hassan Mohammadi, an ISU economics instructor.
Creating a venue for college students to speak directly removes some of the self interests that world media and governmental groups interject into such dialogues, he said.
"Kids talk from the bottom of their hearts," said Mohammadi.