Area residents picked for Rotary sponsored trip

Smith

Two Jacksonville residents have been chosen for a Group Study Exchange sponsored by Rotary International.

Shawn Smith and Amanda Jo Chesshir were chosen to be a part of a five-member group who will travel to Switzerland this spring.

The Group Study Exchange Program of The Rotary Foundation of Rotary International is a unique cultural and vocational exchange opportunity for young business and professional men and women between the ages of 25 and 40 in the initial years of their professional life.

The program provides travel grants for teams of young participants to exchange visits between paired areas in different countries.

For four to six weeks, team members study the host country's institutions and ways of life, observe their own vocations as practiced abroad, develop personal and professional relationships, and exchange ideas.

Shawn and Amanda -- along with three other team members and a group leader -- will spend four weeks living with various host families and meeting with professionals in their similar fields.

Chesshir is a faculty member at Lon Morris College in Jacksonville, where she is an instructor of speech communications, the yearbook sponsor, and the quality enhancement plan director.

Chesshir

In 2006 she was awarded the I.T. Shotwell Outstanding Faculty Member award, and has been at Lon Morris for three years.

Smith is employed by Ana- Lab Corporation in Kilgore where he is the assistant director of business development.