Road Scholars Tour participants listen intently to presentations on Penn State's history, mission and outreach before they take to the road for the 13th annual bus trip. The tour, held May 12-14 this year, offers new and newly tenured Penn State faculty several dynamic opportunities to learn about the University and Pennsylvania as they travel to several Penn State campuses and tour businesses and popular historic sites. For more information visit http://live.psu.edu/story/29428 online. Photos of the second and third days of the tour are available at http://live.psu.edu/stilllife/1680 and http://live.psu.edu/stilllife/1681 online.

Photo Credit: Lisa Powers

Year Taken: 2008

Penn State President Graham Spanier acts as tour guide on the annual Road Scholars Tour, providing an overview for participants on the bus. This is the 13th year the tour has traveled across the state, giving faculty a more complete idea of the vast reach and impact that Penn State has across the Commonwealth.

Photo Credit: Lisa Powers

Year Taken: 2008

At Penn College, delectible foods are part of the 13th Road Scholars Tour. A lunch at Le Jeune Chef showcases the culinary skills of students in one of this Penn State campus' many programs.

Photo Credit: Lisa Powers

Year Taken: 2008

Timothy Smith, assistant professor of curriculum and instruction at University Park, examines a plastic bottle made by students in Penn College's Plastics and Polymer Technology Program. Penn College trains students in plastics to work in one of the nearly 700 plastics facilities in Pennsylvania. Linkages with industry are critical to the success of the program and its graduates.

Photo Credit: Lisa Powers

Year Taken: 2008

Patrick Drohan, assistant professor of crop and soil science at University Park and a participant in the 2008 Road Scholars Tour, takes a closer look at the tools and household artifacts used in everyday life by a family that lives in a coal mining town. The Village of Eckley Mines, which still exists today, has been preserved and 11 families still live in the area.

Photo Credit: Lisa Powers

Year Taken: 2008

Bill Strausner, an educator with Eckley Miners' Village in Weatherly, talks about the Protestant church in the village that played a large part in the lives of the miners who lived in the company mining town that was settled in 1854. The historic site preserves a way of life that dominated the anthracite coal region near the Penn State Hazleton campus.

Photo Credit: Lisa Powers

Year Taken: 2008

Eric Novotny, assistant librarian at University Park, examines information about medical care in the 1800s in the Eckley Mines' Village museum as part of the 13th annual Road Scholars tour, which this year covers southcentral Pennsylvania.

Photo Credit: Lisa Powers

Year Taken: 2008

Penn State Hazleton Chancellor Gary Lawler greets Hakan Can, assistant professor from Penn State Schuylkill, as the the Road Scholars arrive at his campus.

Photo Credit: Susan Bartal

Year Taken: 2008

The 55 individuals on the Road Scholars trip gather their belongings from the bus as they head to the residence halls at Penn State Hazleton.

Photo Credit: Susan Bartal

Year Taken: 2008