Be sure to check out daily deals and other ideas, too, at Houston on the Cheap. For the most up-to-date offers, follow on the site on Twitter, or “like” them on Facebook!

Free Museum Days
To get to the Museum District, walk seven blocks from the Convention Center toward downtown Houston and take the MetroRail Red Line from Main Street. A one-way fare is $1.25. Check the Metro Web site for more information. (Prefer to bike around town? Check out Houston B-cycle, the city’s bike sharing program.)

Always Free
The Holocaust Museum Houston, 5401 Caroline Street, is free to the public and open 7 days a week from 9 a.m.-5 p.m.

The Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, 5216 Montrose Boulevard, is free and open 5 days a week. It’s closed on Monday and Tuesday. Hours vary.

The Menil Collection, 1533 Sul Ross Street, is located next to the University of Saint Thomas, about 3.5 miles from the Convention Center. They are closed on Monday and Tuesday. You can take Bus 81/82 from the Convention Center to Westheimer Road and Mulberry Street, then walk 10 minutes to the museum.

In addition to the Menil Collection, there is also the Rothko Chapel, open 10a.m.-6 p.m. daily, and the Byzantine Fresco Chapel, open Wednesday-Sunday. Both are located in the museum complex.

Tuesday
The Houston Museum of Natural Science‘s permanent exhibits are free to the public from 2-8 p.m. Tuesdays. The special exhibitions (Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition and Warriors, Tombs, and Temples: China’s Enduring Legacy, featuring the life-size Terra Cotta Warriors) are not free. The museum is located next to Hermann Park, at 5555 Hermann Park Drive.

Thursday
The biggest museum in the district, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 1001 Bissonnet Street, is free on Thursdays. They currently have several exhibitions: Modern and Contemporary Masterworks from Malba-Fundaciόn Constantini, Drawings by Rembrandt, His Students, and Circle; and a collection of ceramics. Check out the museum blog for more information!

The McGovern Museum of Health and Medical Science, 1515 Hermann Drive, also has free admission 2-5 p.m. Thursdays. The museum is located across the street from the Houston Garden Center at Hermann Park.

Parks
Discovery Green, site of the Opening Celebration, has many different indoor and outdoor spaces to enjoy. Looking to get some exercise while in Houston? There are free fitness classes (including yoga and zumba) each morning right on Discovery Green. There’s also a jogging trail.

At 445 acres, Hermann Park, one stop past the Museum District on the Red Line MetroRail, is one of Houston’s most popular green spaces.

In addition to the park itself, the Miller Outdoor Theatre, located on the grounds, features both covered (requires free tickets) and open-air seating. Some of the performances scheduled during the annual conference are Dancin’ in the Street: Motown & More Revue at 8:15-11 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, May 26-27; Swing, Jive & Pop Into Dance 11 a.m.-12 p.m. on Thursday, May 31, and Sizzling Summer Dance on 8:30-10:30 p.m. Friday, June 1. Check out the links above for information on how to get tickets.

The Houston Zoo (not free) and Houston Garden Center are also located in Hermann Park.

Podcast Walking Tours
The TravelTex Web site has an audio walking tour of downtown Houston (2.5 miles) and other cities in Texas. You can download the audio file and transcript for the tour on their Web site, load the audio on your iPod or other MP3 player, and head out on the tour. TravelTex also has a mobile site you can use to search for information about Houston and other Texas cities.

• Audio File (42.7mb)
• Tour Transcript
• Tour FAQ

City Maps and Walks is a free app for the iPhone that has maps and walks for more than 470 cities created by GPSmyCity. You can download the app for free at the iTunes Store. There’s even a tour of St. Louis to keep in mind for the NAFSA 2013 Annual Conference.

Free Boat Tour
If you don’t have time to go on a cruise from Galveston before or after the conference, you can reserve a ride on the M/V Sam Houston for a tour of the Port of Houston. While there are no tours on Mondays, there are either one or two tours daily the rest of the week. Reservations are required, and can be made online using the link above.

Watch for updates on Twitter with the conference hashtag #nafsa12 for additional freebies or cheap deals from the Houston on the Cheap and other local businesses downtown and around the Convention Center.

Mark Powell has spent his career working in academia both at Brigham Young University and the University of Texas at Austin. He made his first study abroad trip to the Soviet Union in 1991. In addition to studying Russian, he has taught ESL in the United States, Mexico, and Russia. He has been involved in NAFSA for almost six years. He served on the Region III Team for three and a half years as the Tech SIG Liaison. He most recently was the co-organizer of the first ever Technology Fair at the NAFSA Conference in 2011 in Vancouver. He will be coordinating the Technology Fair again in Houston this year. Mark lived in Austin, TX for the past 18 years and loved it there. Currently, he is a Program Coordinator of the Intensive English Language Program in the University of New Orleans’ Division of International Education.

Although my own experience wasn’t exactly like the one described above, it was unforgettable, overwhelming, and life-changing. Last May, not even a month after graduating from college, I attended NAFSA’s 2011 Annual Conference & Expo in Vancouver, British Columbia. As the recipient of the GlobaLinks Learning Abroad Alumna of the Year Award, I had the privilege of joining nearly 9,000 other international education professionals for what I would later call my “first business trip.”

Navigating the conference as an undergraduate student with no real experience in the field was not an easy task—but I was up for the challenge. I soon found myself making connections, handing out my résumé, discovering new opportunities, and, most importantly, learning about the incredible field of international education.

A Combination of Passions
I studied abroad at Kingston University in London in the spring of 2010. My GlobaLinks adviser, Rachael, and the other GlobaLinks staff played a crucial role in making study abroad a reality for me. During my introspective moments in London, I began to wonder what I would do with a BA in English literature after graduation. I started to realize a job such as Rachael’s would be a perfect combination of so many of my passions—travel, education, and helping others. It wasn’t until I received the GlobaLinks award and spent nearly five days trying to soak in every aspect of the NAFSA conference, however, that I began to understand what the field of international education is really about.

Joining the Family
During the annual conference’s First-Timers Orientation, I learned how NAFSA’s membership in the United States is organized into regions. Since I did not work in a particular region, but had recently graduated from a university in North Carolina, I attended the Region VII update meeting. Later, at a meeting of international educators from Region II, I learned about the DREAM Act as well as NAFSA’s commitment to students who are affected by immigration regulations.

In a small meeting with one of GlobaLinks’ affiliate foreign institutions, I learned about the complexities of arranging agreements across different cultures and communicating those differences to students and faculty. Then, in my time at both the GlobaLinks booth and the Kingston University booth, I learned about the incredible camaraderie that exists among international educators. It was then that I knew I wanted to be a part of this massive and impressive family.

It would be impossible for me to summarize all that I learned at the annual conference, but I could not have asked for a more poignant introduction to the field. I am so thankful to have been so warmly welcomed into the NAFSA family, and for being given the opportunity to be a part of the greatest professional and educational field.

Leslie Pitman attended Queens University of Charlotte and is now pursuing her MEd at the University of South Carolina.

Country
As this is Texas, I must start off with country music. If you’ve ever seen the movie Urban Cowboy with John Travolta and Debra Winger, you would remember Gilley’s Club in Pasadena, Texas—and the leading lady’s quest to find a “real cowboy.” Gilley’s no longer exists here in the Houston area, but there’s still a place where cowboy hats and cowboy boots rule the dance floor. If you’re in the mood to two-step, it’s called Big Texas Dance Hall & Saloon.

(Don’t know how to two-step, but have always wanted to learn? You are in luck! Big Texas offers free dance lessons from 6-7 p.m. Need a cowboy hat? They’ll be on sale at the Opening Celebration on the Green.)

The seventies, eighties, and nineties
For those of you who remember music that was easy to dance to (Michael Jackson, the Bee Gees, MC Hammer, KC and the Sunshine Band) and would like to revisit those days, look no further than The Hop .

Blues/Jazz
My favorite jazz place is the Red Cat Jazz Café. The environment has an intimate setting, with musicians who will amaze you and food that will tantalize the senses. If you are looking for a laid-back, yet sophisticated setting, be sure to check it out.

Latin
If you are not familiar with Tejano music, check out the movie Selena, which should give you a good foundation. But for those of you who miss the sound of a live squeezebox, Tejano plays on at Hallabaloos, where you will entertained by Tejano greats such as Jay Perez, Emilio Navaira, Ruben “El Gato Negro” Ramos, and the “King of the Brown Sound,” Little Joe. Ay te watcho! Or, see you later!

Karaoke
We’re all aware that NAFSAns have been known to belt out a song or two—so what better place to do it than in Houston’s karaoke bars? Check out this list of the top karaoke bars in the city, where you can sing to your heart’s content.

Austin
If you are planning an overnight stay in nearby Austin, Sixth Street is where it’s happening at night. The area’s Web site can give you a good overview of what’s available. On Sixth Street, you can find just about every type of music. I was able to dance the night away at a techno club on one occasion, and, on another, sit back and relax at a quaint blues lounge—all within a few blocks from each other.

Well that sums it up for me. Now it is your turn, fellow Houstonians. Where do you like to get your groove on?

Toni Rico has worked in international admissions and advising for more than 10 years, starting at Texas Tech University. She has since been at San Jacinto Community College, and is now at the University of Houston-Clear Lake, where she is an international student adviser.

You can speak with Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials directly at the DHS Pavilion in the expo hall throughout NAFSA 2012 Annual Conference & Expo.  More than 50 DHS officials will staff the pavilion, including many from SEVP and others from Secretary Napolitano’s Office of Academic Engagement, USCIS, CBP, and the ICE Counterterrorism and Criminal Exploitation Unit, among others.

NAFSA staff and the International Student and Scholar Regulatory Practice Committee (ISS-RP) conduct regular liaison with DHS on your behalf.  We communicate your concerns (gathered through IssueNet and other vehicles), make recommendations and requests, and provide information to DHS about your work and the enterprise of international education.  We report to you on our liaison activities and publish information and documents that we obtain.  And through her participation on DHS Secretary Napolitano’s Homeland Security Academic Advisory Council (HSAAC), NAFSA CEO Marlene Johnson will be able to bring NAFSAns’ concerns and recommendations to the attention of top DHS leadership.

I’m sure that you’d like to share your concerns and suggestions directly with DHS officials, though, and this is a great opportunity to do so.  Let them know how they’re affecting your work, both what they’d doing well and how they could make improvements and reduce the barriers to international education and the burdens on international educators.  Need to jog your memory about some of the issues?  Take a look at NAFSA’s DHS regulatory practice liaison and advocacy priorities, which will inform NAFSA’s participation on HSAAC and may help you organize your own discussion points.  Also, let us know through IssueNet if you’d like to see other priorities added.  And remember that NAFSA staff and the ISS-RP are always interested in hearing about your regulatory problems and concerns, and we review IssueNet every week, so let us know.

We look forward to seeing you in Houston (and at the DHS pavilion)!

Plan ahead. Familiarize yourself with the conference schedule ahead of time and figure out which learning opportunities you don’t want to miss. Remember, some sessions at the conference will be recorded—look for the headphones icon next to the session in Conference Connection—and often session handouts are posted to the site by mid-May.

Remember to network. Networking should be a priority on your schedule, as it happens every minute of the conference. It’s likely you will learn as much through your conversations with colleagues as you do in the sessions. The open meetings and member interest groups are a great way to network because they break the conference down into smaller, more manageable groups that are of interest to you. Participate in as many of these as you like.

Make use of available technology, especially Conference Connection. Check out LAT blogger Mark Powell’s post about using technology to help you have a successful conference experience.

Set up meetings ahead of time. Other attendees will be as busy as you are, so decide on when and where to meet ahead of time. Conference Connection is a great way to connect with other attendees and set up appointments. You can filter and search the list of attendees by a variety of categories to help you narrow down the attendees that are most relevant to you.

Attend first-timer events. There will be a lot of meet-up events throughout the conference dedicated to first-timers. These offerings are built to help you network and meet others who share something in common with you. Visit the first-timers Web site for a list of all these offerings.

Visit the International Education Expo Hall. There will be more than 400 exhibitors from all over the world ready to meet and build relationships with you and your institution. From 10:30 a.m.-2 p.m. on Thursday, there will be dedicated expo time for this, meaning you won’t miss any sessions. In my experience, visiting the expo hall takes longer than expected, so setting aside time is extremely important. You never know what relationships might develop there.

*Tip! Look at the interactive Expo Hall Map to get a sense of where your potential partners will be.

Participate in a mentor program. NAFSA is offering three different mentor programs at the conference this year. They’re a great way to network and make connections. To participate in one of these programs, you’ll need to sign-up in advance:

• EA KC Connector Program
• Student Mentor Program
• KC ISSS Buddy Program

Have fun! Exhibitors, sponsors, and vendors might invite you to events outside of the conference so you can learn more about their company or product. The conference isn’t meant to be solely educational; it’s meant to be fun, too. Be sure to save some time for sightseeing activities in Houston.

Learn from others. The session, workshop, and poster presenters are excited about sharing their topics with you. Don’t be afraid to ask questions. It’s likely that another person in the audience has the same question as you. If you haven’t attended a poster fair before, I highly encourage you to do so. This is a great way to talk one-on-one with presenters about topics of interest to you, not to mention an excellent way to build your personal network. Visit the NAFSA Web site for a list of the 16 poster fairs taking place.

Feel free to walk out. You only have a week to obtain as much information as possible. If you are attending a session that you don’t think is going to be helpful after hearing the beginning of the presentation, it is OK to leave and find another.

Take lots of business cards. Even when you think that you have enough, take more! Don’t forget to request business cards from the people you meet. I always jot down something on the back of the card that will help me remember the conversation I had with that person. Remember also to follow up with these contacts after the conference—this is just as important as meeting them.

*Did you know…each attendee receives an “electronic business card” in his or her registration packet? The barcode on the card carries your contact information, allowing exhibitors to collect this information effortlessly—a real time-saver for exhibitors and attendees. Place this code in the back window of your name badge.

Pack comfortable shoes and bring layers of clothing. Although you will be in Texas during the summer, be prepared for cool conference rooms.

Make an effort! Even if you are shy, you should make an effort to meet others. NAFSAns are very friendly and always looking to meet new people. This was something that really stuck out to me during my first conference. Put on that smile and work it!

Take your meeting to a restaurant. Some of the best meetings I have attended during the conference haven’t been in the convention center. Take advantage of the area and set up your meeting outside of it. If you’re looking for some great recommendations, check our blog on our favorite Houston restaurants.

Don’t forget to attend the First-Timers Chat at 4 p.m. EDT on May 8. For additional tips and more specifics, especially related to career building, be sure to check out the transcript from a previous First-Timers Chat on April 26.

For those who have been to the annual conference before, what other advice might you give? For those of you who haven’t been to the annual conference before, what else would you like to know?

Janel Lockwood is the Local Arrangements Committee (LAT) communications chair for NAFSA’s 2012 Annual Conference & Expo. Janel began her career in international education at Old Dominion University. There, she completed an internship at the United States-India Educational Foundation in New Delhi, India, and was awarded Outstanding Graduate Student in the Higher Education Administration. She has been working in the field of international education for seven years and is an international student adviser at the University of Houston-Clear Lake. Janel is pursuing a doctorate of education at Lamar University. She has been living in Houston for two years, and enjoys the city’s diversity.

Mobile Web sites
Mobile Web sites are specially created Web sites designed to work on smartphones and tablets. They generally contain only the crucial and functional features of a desktop Web site. There are two specific mobile Web sites that have been created for the 2012 Conference in Houston: the conference mobile Web site and the Conference Connection mobile Web site. You can learn how to use these two mobile sites by watching the video below:

Mobile Apps
There are many mobile apps that are available for smartphones that will be of great help during the conference. They will help you find places to eat, exchange “virtual business cards,” scan QR codes for information, and help you manage your volunteer shifts at the conference.

Urbanspoon
Have you been researching the many delicious restaurants in Houston? Have you checked out the Good Eats food blog for restaurant suggestions? Want to venture out on your own gastronomic quest in Houston? If the last option is how you like to roll, Urbanspoon is the app for you. You can search nearby restaurants or if you’re feeling lucky, select a neighborhood and cuisine and let Urbanspoon do the picking for you.

• Urbanspoon for iPhone
• Urbanspoon for iPad
• Urbanspoon for Android
• Urbanspoon for Amazon Kindle
• Urbanspoon for Blackberry

Bump
Did you not bring enough business cards with you to the conference or did you forget them when packing? If you have an iPhone or Android phone, your problem is solved. You can download the Bump mobile app and share your contact information with other iPhone and Android phone users. After installing the app, select the contact information you want to share and bump phones with the person you want to share your contact information with. It’s as simple as that.

• Bump for iPhone
• Bump for Android

QR Code Scanners
Wondering what the funny looking checkered graphic does? That’s a QR code (Quick Response Code) which is a type of matrix barcode which has become popular for disseminating information via smartphones. You might see barcodes in the Expo Hall or other areas around the convention center. Many QR code scanner/readers are available for your mobile device. The example QR code will take you to a page for more information about the Tech Fair at NAFSA.

• iPhone App Store
• Android Market
• Blackberry App World

ShiftBoard
Those of you who have volunteered for the Conference received a link to the ShiftBoard Web site to schedule volunteer shifts during the conference. Shiftboard has a mobile app for the iPhone which you can use during the conference. If you need to add or delete shifts, you can do it all on your phone. If you are interested in volunteering there are still plenty of shifts available for you to pick up. Learn more at www.nafsa.org/ac12volunteer.

• Shiftboard for iPhone

Twitter
If you have a Twitter account, don’t forget to use the #NAFSA12 hashtag when tweeting about the conference! Be sure to add one of the Tweetups to your agenda where you can meet up with fellow NAFSA tweeters.

You have less than four weeks to use these mobile apps and Web sites to prepare yourself for the 2012 NAFSA Annual Conference & Expo in Houston. There will be Wi-Fi available for free in the public spaces located on levels two and three of the George R. Brown Convention Center. See you in Houston!

Are you bringing a tablet to the conference? If so, what apps are you planning to use for taking notes and organizing your conference experience?

Mark Powell has spent his career working in academia both at Brigham Young University and the University of Texas at Austin. He made his first study abroad trip to the Soviet Union in 1991. In addition to studying Russian, he has taught ESL in the United States, Mexico, and Russia. He has been involved in NAFSA for almost six years. He served on the Region III Team for three and a half years as the Tech SIG Liaison. He most recently was the co-organizer of the first ever Technology Fair at the NAFSA Conference in 2011 in Vancouver. He will be coordinating the Technology Fair again in Houston this year. Mark lived in Austin, TX for the past 18 years and loved it there. Currently, he is the Program Coordinator, IELP Division of International Education at University of New Orleans

In addition to Gryskiewicz, the committee has invited five other guest speakers. Alise Isbell, founder of Write Wise Communications, will tackle negotiation skills, a very relevant topic to many international educators. Eric Stoller, a well-known social media expert in higher education, will provide a high-level assessment of social media. Valeria Heuberger, PhD, from the Austrian Academy of Sciences, will discuss working with Muslim students, while World Bank expert Adriana Jaramillo will discuss higher education trends in the Middle East and North Africa. Additionally, University of Houston Law Center professor Jordan Paust, JD, will be speaking on universal human rights. All of these speakers will provide valuable insight from other fields that impact international education, and carry the potential to help us all be better professionals. I hope you make these sessions a priority as you plan your conference schedule.  

Moreover, ACC workshop chair David Wick, EdD, and all of the workshop trainers, have been hard at work refining the content of offered workshops. Preconference workshops are an excellent source for professional development. For example, the following are offerings that feature curricula likely to enhance how you do your job:

• Vision-Driven Personal Leadership for International Educators: More than Intercultural Competence
• Developing Research Skills to Strengthen International Education Management Strategies
• Navigating Institutional Politics: Successfully Moving Your Initiatives Forward
• Using Empirical Evidence and Data Solutions to Support International Education Strategies

Finally, I encourage you to attend the poster fairs. There are 16 themes, including technology and social media, with more than 500 presenters. If you haven’t attended a poster fair at a previous conference, they provide a great opportunity to share valuable knowledge in a one-on-one atmosphere. A special thanks to poster fair chair of the ACC Kim Beisecker and all poster fair organizers for their important contributions to the conference.

Which of the professional and leadership offerings or guest speaker sessions are you most excited about and why?

Joël Gallegos is the content team chair on the 2012 ACC. He is also the assistant provost for international programs at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Gallegos is the chair of the UNC Exchange Program advisory board and vice chair of CIEE’s Academic Consortium Board. He is an active member of NAFSA, EAIE, AIEA and serves on the Board of Directors of the World Affairs Council of Charlotte. Previously, he served as the director of education abroad at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, and was director of study abroad at the University of Toledo.

Simply put, higher education has no choice but to engage in that debate, because it will define not only what kind of immigration policy the United States constructs for the 21^st century (and whether or not that policy works for higher education), but, perhaps even more importantly, what kind of face the United States presents to the world.

International educators, of course, stand closest to the day-to-day manifestations of a broken immigration system on a college campus: It’s the world-renowned scholar who can’t get back to his laboratory in the United States because of a security mix-up; the accomplished spouse of a foreign student who can’t continue his career in the United States for however many years his wife is here in an academic program; the pioneering scientist whose paper won’t be presented in the United States because she is stuck in a visa backlog; the entrepreneurial foreign graduate who can’t pursue his vision for a new business here because there’s no visa category that fits him.

International educators know countless stories like this. They reflect not just costs to individuals and academic departments, though those are enormous. They reflect serious, long-term costs to entire institutions, and by extension, to our communities and to the United States – costs in innovation, knowledge creation, and imagination lost to antiquated, dysfunctional laws and processes. These stories need to be told – to campus leaders, to members of Congress, to the American public – because they illustrate most clearly higher education’s direct stake in the immigration reform debate.

But higher education’s fate is also tied up with the broader immigration debate in the United States today, because it is accepted wisdom that a comprehensive legislative proposal is the most likely vehicle to emerge for the provisions involving high-skilled immigration that most concern higher education. Various stakeholders might like to carve out solutions for their particular issue, but it is clear that none of the specific immigration challenges the United States faces can be addressed effectively without also addressing the others. So we are in this together – with those who are concerned about border security; with those concerned about undocumented immigrants; and with others concerned about attracting global talent.

Indeed the higher education community must recognize, and articulate, the broader ways in which a dysfunctional immigration system harms the academy, well beyond H-1B caps or green card backlogs. It is the harm done by xenophobic, fear-driven policymaking that does not reflect the values of Americans; by a harsh and ineffective approach to border security; and by congressional inertia that keeps the United States stalled in an outmoded immigration policy that ignores the reality of global mobility.  In these ways, the immigration debate has enormous implications for higher education’s ability to attract teachers, scholars, and students from around the world and to fulfill its educational mission of creating a global space for learning for all students.

On April 26, individuals at 300 institutions participated in a NAFSA teleconference on the basics of how higher education can engage on immigration reform. View a recording of that event, and find out more about how you can be a voice for immigration reform at www.ConnectingOurWorld.org/speakout.

Three seminars are highlighted which tie directly to the theme:

• Wednesday, 10:15 a.m.-12:15 p.m.: Forecasting the Future of Internationalization: View Through the Crystal Ball
• Thursday, 8:00 a.m.-10:00 a.m.: Comprehensive Internationalization: Whose Job Is It Anyway?
• Friday, 9:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m.: Enhancing Your Leadership Contributions and Collaborations for Comprehensive Internationalization

Whether you want to know about world trends in internationalization, how your job enables comprehensive internationalization, or how to lead comprehensive internationalization efforts on campus, we have new materials and insights for you. Regardless of your knowledge community, there are plenty of offerings related to comprehensive internationalization, as well as opportunities to learn from our international colleagues.

What’s a KC? International education is a broad field with many specializations. NAFSA organizes the professional specialties of international education into five main groups (Knowledge Communities or KCs), with teams of member-leaders charged with creating and disseminating knowledge.

Learn more about NAFSA’s efforts related to comprehensive internationalization.

I also encourage you to learn more about our host city, Houston. At 2:45 p.m. Wednesday, May 30, you can learn about the international industries that make Houston an important city for business and education with “International Pillars of Houston.” And if you’ve missed the blog posts about all Houston has to offer, be sure to go back through and read about the Museum District, good eats, and more.

I look forward to seeing you in Houston in a few weeks. If you have any questions about the conference, respond to this blog post or send me a tweet @PatPWiller.

Patricia Willer is the chair of the 2012 ACC. She is also associate vice president for international programs at the University of South Carolina. She has extensive experience in international education leadership, international student services, and education abroad. She is also an advocate for the need for campus collaboration in support of international education. Willer has presented extensively on international education issues. She received her master’s degree in communication studies from the University of Kansas.

Here are our recommendations for near the George R. Brown Convention Center.

• The Shops at Houston Center
• Houston Pavilions
• Market Square Park
• Bayou place

Get a quick tour of the Discovery Green.

Adam Chen is on the Local Arrangement Committee for the NAFSA 2012 Annual Conference & Expo, chairing the Student-Mentor Program. He is an international admissions counselor at the University of Houston. He attended Ohio University, where he taught introductory linguistics courses, advised international students, conducted programming, and obtained his MA in linguistics and MEd in College Student Personnel.

Cory Owen serves as the Support Staff Chair for the NAFSA 2012 Annual Conference & Expo. Cory works at Rice University and is the Program Manager and Senior International Advisor. She is also a Residential Advisor in one of Rice’s eleven residential colleges. Cory is currently pursuing her doctorate in higher education administration at the University of Houston. She has served in various capacities in NAFSA including local arrangement committees, regional registrar, and is currently serving on the Exchange Visitor Program subcommittee of the International Student and Scholar Regulatory Practice Committee. She recently returned from a Fulbright seminar in Germany.