I took some time off from Blogging on this account - three months.

Many developments at the Fulbright Academy - new institutional members, travel and programs in Washington and Winston-Salem, updates on our workshops and conference.

I am particularly excited about the upcoming workshop in Morocco on Digital Libraries and their application to science, education and cultural preservation. We will have around 75 people from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Mauritania, Egypt, Canada, France, the UK and the United States. US participants coming from the Library of Congress, the Getty Museum, the State Department, Harvard, Tufts, the University of Chicago, etc. It will also be our first multi-lingual program with simultaneous translation. I am very grateful to the Moroccan Fulbrighters who approached us and asked us to help facilitate the meeting and manage the US delegation.

The preparations for the Conference in Panama are going well - that is about 11 weeks away, and we have a good set of speakers and presenters. We are still working on sponsors. There will be 100-150 participants - maybe more - it depends on how many Panamanians want to attend. The upper limit will be 150. I found a fun video this morning - time-lapse photography showing boats going through the Panama Canal - I put it on our homepage.

My wife and two of the kids fly to Panama in three weeks, I follow two days later with our oldest. We will be in Panama for 12 weeks - organizing the conference and developing stronger relationships with Latin American institutions. Our apartment is in the center of the city, near the University, so it will be a big change from our suburban existence here in South Portland, Maine. Climate. Language. Culture. Environment.