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Suzanne Nicolas, center, presenting flowers to PLaCE leaders at the May 2024 PLaCE 10-Year Anniversary Showcase Event. 

This summer, we lost a cherished colleague and friend. Suzanne Nicolas was the PLaCE Program Coordinator for over ten years. In the weeks since her passing, colleagues have reflected on memories of Suzanne, moments of guidance, humor, generosity, and friendship. We have gathered some of those reflections here, not only to remember what she accomplished, but also to celebrate the person so many of us were fortunate to know. 

Sabina Zeynalova | Senior Lecturer

Suzanne's email signature cites a famous quote by Maya Angelou: "people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

When I first came to West Lafayette 8 years ago, I didn't know anyone. I'd never been to this town before. Suzanne went above and beyond giving me ideas and advice about apartment searching and other practical questions I had. She offered to meet with me and have coffee. I did not want to impose on her time and thought maybe she's just being polite. However, she extended the offer several times, saying that if I prefer ice cream or a walk somewhere depending on the time that I arrive or need to leave, she's flexible and happy to accommodate.

That act of kindness, that genuine desire to make someone new feel welcome in an unknown environment left a very strong impression on me. Suzanne made me feel like I was already part of the team. She made me feel like I belonged here. There were of course other factors that made me choose the position here at Purdue, but that strong feeling of a warm, genuine, welcome and belonging probably played the most important role.

That's the kind of person Suzanne Nicolas was and that's how many of us will remember her. May she rest in peace.

Matthew Allen | Director

Suzanne loved bringing people together, and she had a gift for creating community. She loved meeting people, hosting events, and connecting people to one another. Suzanne never seemed content for life to simply happen around her; she wanted to make things happen, and she wanted people to experience them together. She filled spaces with her energy and laughter, with color, decorations, celebrations, and conversation. 

She helped to plan countless events, programs, and activities for our international students and visiting scholars, and our staff. Suzanne helped make our program much more than a place to work. She made it a community. That same generous spirit extended outside of normal work hours and locations on campus. Every year, she opened her home for a Friendsgiving dinner and welcomed colleagues, international students, and visiting scholars—often people who were far from family and had nowhere else to go for the holiday. It was important to her that no one felt alone.

Ty Climer | Senior Lecturer

When I think about Suzanne, I don’t think about a dearly loved colleague, but rather as someone that I truly considered as family! Yes, we met when she came to be the program administrator of PLaCE, but ultimately Suzanne liked to have fun and I like to be where the fun is, so we naturally grew close. I know that she was very dedicated to her job even to the end and did a great job, but I will always remember Suzanne as someone who liked to host cookouts at her house for the program staff, Friendsgiving she hosted every year, during which she opened up her house to staff, friends, and international students to experience a Thanksgiving feast (and it was a feast)! Suzanne and I even got a group of Colombian professors who were here for the summer to host a pool party at the apartment complex they were staying. Suzanne was a planner and a great host, but she wanted to make sure everyone always felt welcome and never left her house hungry. I am grateful that I got to know Suzanne and her family, and she got to know my family as well. We were always texting and sending pictures to each other from our vacations or trips to let the other one know we were having a good time. 

After saying all of this, I feel that it would be a disservice for me not to mention that towards the end of Suzanne’s life here on earth, we became even closer. Although Suzanne was always the optimist, she always let me know what was going on when I asked or provided updates on her health when she could. We were able to talk about tenderhearted topics such as faith, and I am honored that I was able to share and talk with her about such personal matters as belief and faith. This is only meant to show how much Suzanne meant to me and why I consider her a part of my family. I will miss being able to text her about TV shows we both watched, updates on my family, or a picture from the beach, or her sending me a picture of her at a stadium somewhere fun enjoying a Purdue football game—the everyday life things you share with family.

PLaCE Lecturer Awarded CIE SoTL Fellowship and CILMAR Seed Grant

New Student Organization Dedicated to Bringing Together Community Members from Different Cultures, Programs, and Disciplines 

The Campus Connection Club, a new student organization at Purdue, was founded in late March 2025 with the goal of "bring[ing] together students from all around the world to participate in some of the most interesting events on campus, providing an immersive experience of Purdue as well as the Greater Lafayette area while encouraging cross-cultural conversations" (Boming Chen, Club President). 

 

The Campus Connections Club originated in spring 2023 as a short course taught by Senior Lecturer Dr. Joseph Sorell, based on the PLaCE foundational courses, SCLA 110 and 111, which feature field trips designed for students to explore local cultures and communities. While the short course has been a great start, enrollment in PLaCE courses is limited to international students and restricted by the academic calendar. To make the experience available year-round and open to the entire Purdue community, a parallel student organization was founded in spring 2025 by several participants of the PLaCE short course. 

PLaCE Team Honored by Vice Provost’s Office at Sept. 2024 Teaching Excellence Celebration

Malaysian Student Association Purdue Indianapolis: A Home Away from Home and a Bridge to Malaysian Culture

 

PLaCE has offered the three-credit undergraduate course sequence, SCLA 110 and 111, at Purdue University in Indianapolis (PIN) since Fall 2024. SCLA 110 and 111 have been known to serve as an intercultural hub and a supportive community for first-year international students. In Spring 2025, a small group of students from these courses took the initiative to establish the Malaysian Student Association (MSA) at Purdue University in Indianapolis—an organization “dedicated to fostering a sense of community among Malaysian students while promoting Malaysian culture to the campus and wider Indianapolis community” (Boilerlink).

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PLaCE Lecturer Participated in Steps to Leaps Perspective Project

PLaCE Lecturer Dr. Parvaneh Rezaee participated in the Steps to Leaps Perspective Project—an initiative led by the Office of the Vice Provost for Student Life and the Office of the Vice Provost for Teaching and Learning—from summer to fall 2024. She integrated the WELL-BEING and LEADERSHIP pillars into her SCLA 110 course to help "enhance the academic experience and promote student well-being," particularly among her own students. Through targeted course activities, her students engaged with core well-being concepts and reflected on their leadership potential.

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Senior Lecturer Reflects on PLaCE's and Her Own Contribution to Colombia Purdue Partnership

Hannah Bush, a Senior Lecturer who joined PLaCE in 2014, is one of the PLaCE lecturers who have been involved in the design and implementation of various English language courses and short-term immersive programs offered by PLaCE to contribute to the Colombia Purdue Partnership. More recently, she has created a Language and Cultural Exchange Program for Educators in Colombia. This story has more details about this LaCE program as well as Hannah Bush's professional and intercultural experiences during her trip to Colombia in May 2024.

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PLaCE Instructor Teams Invited to Present at 2024 Festival of Teaching and Learning

During the inaugural Festival in April 2024, Dr. Haiyan Li, Dr. Minsun Kim, Ty Climer, and Dr. Lixia Cheng introduced a forward-thinking pedagogical approach to integrating instructor-guided ChatGPT training in an undergraduate Language and Cultural Exchange course for international ESL students. Drs. Parvaneh Rezaee and Matthew Allen shared their "story stack" activity, a low-tech yet impactful method for launching digital storytelling in PLaCE's SCLA 110, 111, and Short Courses. The team of Li, Kim, Climer, & Cheng was one of two recipients of the "Innovation Hub Award for Innovative Uses of Generative AI" in 2024.

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