Denver Sister Cities International

The name ‘Ulaɣan Baɣatur’ literally translates to “red hero” in honor of military leader Damdin Sukhbaatar, whose warriors liberated Mongolia from Chinese occupation in 1921.

Under an Ulaanbaatar/Denver Sister Cities Committee program, in 2006 four high schools from across the globe began a series of exchanges that involved both students and teachers in four U.S. and Mongolian communities. Representing rural and urban areas, these high schools are situated on the Navajo Nation, Mandalgov, Ulaanbaatar, and Denver, CO.

By the spring of 2007, the first group of students and teachers had participated in the inaugural annual exchange. There was great excitement when they met for the first time! Quickly, they developed true friendships–while completing a service-learning project, visiting each school and residing with host families. Bridges of understanding were quickly established.

The Luby-Jenkins School Pairing Program, named after Nancy Luby, former Chair of the Denver Sister Cities Ulaanbaatar Chair and Walt Jenkins, has brought together students and their teachers to learn through direct educational and personal experiences about each other and their cultures. The program’s mission is to build a permanent relationship between rural and urban high schools across and within borders, to provide international experiences and cultural learning in all four schools, to develop professional exchanges for teachers and administrators, to develop foreign language skills and to empower student leaders at each of the high schools. The participating schools are:

• Ireedui Tsogtsolbor (Future Complex) High School #1 Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
• Erdmiin Dalai Tsogtsolbor (Ocean Knowledge Complex) School Mandalgov, Mongolia
• Greyhills Academy High School Tuba City, Arizona, U.S.
• Denver Center for International Studies Denver, Colorado, U.S.

During exchanges to Mongolia, the U.S. students and teachers are guests of the two Mongolian schools. When in the U.S., the Mongolians are hosted at Greyhills and Denver. The Denver Zoo provides many of the supportive activities and programs. Additional activities are planned during travel between Colorado and the Navajo Reservation. The Zorig Foundation provides organizational and financial support in Mongolia.

Schools Involved:

Ireedui Tsogtsolbor or Future Complex High School #1, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
Part of a complex of schools, Future Complex serves the western suburbs of the urban population of Ulaanbaatar. The school provides grades one through eleven in this rapidly expanding city for students and families of the “ger” suburbs and recent immigrants from the countryside. All students are day students as there is no residential facility. Many graduates of the school continue their studies at either the universities in Ulaanbaatar or abroad.
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Erdmiin Dalai Tsogtsolbor (Ocean Knowledge Complex School, Mandalgov, Mongolia
As the school for a major area of the Dundgov Aimag, Ocean Knowledge Complex School provides grades one through eleven for students and their families in an area as wide as 150 kilometers. The school provides boarding facilities for a significant population of the students. It is one of only two high schools in the Dundgov Aimag, an area of mostly nomadic herdspeople south of the capital. Continuing studies by many of the graduates include colleges, institutes and universities in the capital of Ulaanbaatar.
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Greyhills Academy High School, Tuba City, Arizona, USA
Greyhills Academy High School serves the students and families living in the western Navajo Nation area. Its mission statement states the school is committed to providing a nurturing and safe environment where culturally-based, and academically challenging programs are utilized in providing holistic, experiential and problem-based learning that promotes life-long learners and whose knowledge will benefit Dine, First Nation’s people and global societies. The school student population is approximately 550 in grades nine through twelve, with both residential and day school programs. The graduates continue their studies at colleges and universities throughout the area.
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Denver Center for International Studies, Denver, Colorado, USA
Denver Center for International Studies or DCIS is a magnet school within the Denver Public School System. It serves a student population of approximately 500 in grades six through twelve. Its mission statement states DCIS prepares students for college by developing multilingual, interculturally-competent citizens who are actively involved in our rapidly changing world. With a firm foundation of challenging and relevant coursework, intercultural interaction and international opportunities, DCIS students learn by doing, choosing, and directing many of their own internationally focused projects.

In November of 2001, after a trade mission that took him throughout Asia, former Mayor Webb returned to Denver with the intention of making Ulaanbaatar our tenth sister city. However, for many years prior to the Mayor’s visit, people in Denver and Ulaanbaatar were working hard to make this sister city relationship a reality. After a resolution was passed by the city council, and a visit from the Mayor of Ulaanbaatar to make everything official, Ulaanbaatar became the most recent addition to Denver’s ever growing family of sister cities.

One of the most compelling reasons for our sister city relationship with Ulaanbaatar is a fact about the City of Denver that very few residents are aware of. Outside of Mongolia itself, Denver is home to the largest Mongolian population in the U.S. With this strong relationship and cultural exchange having been in place for many years, an official sister city relationship was the logical progression. With so much interest and participants available, the Denver-Ulaanbaatar Committee was able to start strong with many members.

In the summer of 2002 a display case was dedicated to Ulaanbaatar in the City and County Building. This case houses artifacts from Ulaanbaatar, and lets all visitors to Denver’s official “home” know that this sister city relationship exists. To further highlight this relationship, the Ulaanbaatar Committee is being approved to name one of unnamed parks of Denver as the City of Ulaanbaatar Park in Denver.

Prior to Mongolia’s conversion to a free market and democratic nation in 1990, a relationship was started between Mongolia’s capital city, Ulaanbaatar, and Denver. This occurred when the first Mongolian students were sent to the United States in 1989. Two of the students that came that year attended the Colorado School of Mines.

Shortly thereafter a Colorado nonprofit, the Colorado-Mongolia Project was formed to both promote better relations and to engineer a Sister City, or as Mongolians call it a Brother City, relationship.

From the City and County of Denver and the metro Denver area Mongolian business, cultural and educational exchanges flourished. Denver law firms began working in Mongolia, university programs were forged, particularly with the University of Colorado at Denver, and then Denver headquartered mining and mining equipment companies began actively operating in Mongolia. The Denver Art Museum put on a trail blazing and highly successful Mongolian art exhibit with other cultural and art exchanges to follow. Along the way these two early Mongolian students grew to many hundreds and today Denver has over 2,500 Mongolians living in the metropolitan area and the largest Mongolian community in the Americas.

Mongolia designated an honorary consul for Denver in 1999 and the mayors and respective city assemblies formally designated a Sister City relationship in 2002. With recent visits to Denver by Mongolia’s Prime Minster and then its President the recognition of this growing relationship accelerated. Today increasingly business is being conducted between these two cities, numerous Ulaanbaatar/Denver cultural, research, and foundation activities are being carried out and the newly formed Mongolian Community Association of Colorado, along with Denver Sister Cities International’s Ulaanbaatar Denver Sister Cities Committee, are carrying out mission of the Colorado-Mongolia Project.

Unquestionably, the Denver-Ulaanbaatar relationship has considerable meaning and benefits for both cities. Two cities, on opposite sides of the world, located in surprisingly similar environments and with expanding urban areas have much to share. However, maybe most importantly Denver’s international perspective has been enhanced and the expanding needs of Ulaanbaatar are being assisted through a vibrant and intriguing people-to-people, business-to-business and city-to-city relationship.

• The year 2009 marks the 20th anniversary of the first Mongolians to move to Denver. In 1989, two Mongolian students began graduate work at the Colorado School of Mines.
• Since 1989, the Mongolian community has established local business ties, educational and cultural programs, and places of worship in Denver. Colorado has become a center of Mongolian activities in the United States, through creation of the Mongolian Community Association of Colorado, appointment of a local honorary consul, and visits by various Mongolian dignitaries. Additionally, the local Mongolian community maintains many traditions, including celebrating the Naadam, an annual sports festival dating to the time of Genghis Khan, and the Mongolian New Year, plus supporting the Colorado Mongolian School to ensure their heritage is passed on to the growing number of first-generation Mongolian Americans.
• Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia, has been a sister city to Denver since 2004. To celebrate this special connection between both cities, Denver recently constructed and dedicated the City of Ulaanbaatar Park in Lowry.
• To coincide with the opening of Genghis Khan at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, Denver hosted the 1st Quadrennial North American Khuraldai, a gathering of Mongolians from the United States, Mexico, Canada, and Mongolia to discuss various topics, including education, immigration, health care, arts, community organization, sister city programs, honorary consuls, Mongolian schools, and sports tournaments. The event was planned by the Mongolian Community Association of Colorado, and supported by the Ulaanbaatar Denver Sister Cities Committee and the honorary consul of Mongolia in Colorado.
• Also in conjunction with the exhibition, the Ulaanbaatar Denver Sister Cities Committee hosted a gala on October 16 to raise funds for the Luby-Jenkins School Pairing Program, a high school exchange program between Mongolia and the United States.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2etisWyufmE

http://www.westword.com/2006-07-06/news/among-the-mongols/

http://cbs4denver.com/local/genghis.khan.hickenlooper.2.1250318.html

For additional information on Denver’s Mongolian community and their upcoming events, visit  http://mongoliadenver.org/

CHAIR: Harriet Downer

303.601.8591
hsdowner@logicalconnections.org

Vice-Chair: Khulan Dashpuntsag

720.628.3247
 khulan.dashpuntsag@ucdenver.edu

Honorary Consul of Mongolia

Jim Wagenlander
legalsupport@wagenlander.com