German Section 6 
Professional Development and Support (post graduation)

During the past three years, one of our German faculty at Eastern Michigan University, Klaus Tappe, was first vice-president and the president of the Michigan chapter of the American Association of Teachers of German (until January 1, 2002). In that capacity, Klaus Tappe had (and still has) very close contact with Michigan's K-12 German Teachers due to the many preparation workshops (training the trainers - where German teachers are trained to train fellow teachers). He also organized a workshop/discussion/plant tour at the new Daimler-Chrysler engine plant in Detroit which was attended by many HS German teachers. Klaus Tappe is relentlessly working to bring people from German American companies and Michigan German teachers from High Schools and colleges together to explore internship opportunities for our students, company visits, and other forms of corporation. Carla Damiano, Margrit Zinggeler, and Klaus Tappe have participated in the spring workshops of the MI-AATG which always bring together college instructors with HS German teachers. For documentation of Klaus Tappe, please see the website:http://www.goethe.de/uk/chi/netz10/netz1058.htm

John Hubbard and Margrit Zinggeler are very active visiting German classes in area High Schools. They are either invited for special events, like career days or world language information events or they actively seek the opportunity through contacts with German teachers. We have thereby developed many informal ways of keeping in touch with former students who are now high school teachers for recruiting new students for our programs.

All four German instructors at Eastern Michigan University participate every year at the Michigan Foreign Language Teacher Association Convention, where they have established personal relationships with HS teachers.

At this time, we do not have a well-defined professional development program with our former German students who have become German teachers.

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