Michael Lastinger has garnered volumes of praise over the years for the Web-based courses in French language and literature he teaches from West Virginia University.

He has cyberspace fans in the form of language scholars from Vienna to Vietnam, and most summers, he travels to Vendee, France, where his study abroad programs there are now legendary.

The professor this past summer received an appointment at WVU that will make his global mission even more so. He was named interim director of the Office of International Programs. He will oversee the offices study abroad efforts and other outreach around the world.

He replaces Daniel Weiner, who left this summer to accept a similar post at Ohio University. A national search will be opened later for a permanent director.

Lastingers appointment, as he said, will hardly seem foreign to a scholar who is well at home in foreign locales.

This is really just a broader effort of what Ive been doing all along at WVU ,Lastinger said.The idea is to get our students out there, beyond classroom walls and past borders. Were taking that line about how �€~travel broadens the mindliterallybecause it does.

Lastinger, in fact, just returned to Morgantown this past weekend from Mexico, where he met with faculty and administrators at the University of Guanajuato, which has long partnered with WVU in international exchange efforts.

It was a fantastic experience,he said.Our two schools have been friends for a long time. Mexico is a beautiful country with caring, gracious people. I was nothing but impressed by the students and faculty of Guanajuto.

From Australia to Zimbabwe, WVU s Office of International Programs helps manage nearly 80 partnerships, including Guanajuto, with other schools across the globe. The office also participates in 33 other international exchange programs for students and faculty.

Like stamps on a passport, Lastinger wants to add to that. And WVU like any good traveler, he saidis already packed and more than ready to embark.

Were a global University, and thats all there is to it,he said.I want us to foster the great exchange programs we already have while making new friends. Five years from now, I want us to be the leader in a higher education system that surpasses boundaries and borders in our international mission. We can do it because were getting there now.

Interim Provost E. Jane Martin said Lastingers enthusiasm as an educator makes him a hit anywherefrom Morgantown to Morocco.

I cant think of a better person to head such an important office,Martin said.Mike Lastinger is a true Mountaineer ambassador, and he knows that our students who go forth in the world to do good work are too.

Lastinger has taught more than 15 courses in French language, literature and humanities in the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences since setting foot on campus in 1989. He specializes in 19th century literature and culture, and is an authority on French thinkers and writers Arthur Rimbaud, Honoré de Balzac andmile Zola.

He has received Outstanding Teacher awards from Eberly and the WVU Foundation.

Lastinger holds degrees from Valdosta State and the University of Georgia.