When Helena Knorr asked her organizational leadership class whether people are born leaders or become leaders, Panther Bior’s answer became a catalyst his professor and many of his classmates never would have expected.Bior, brought a movie to class as a sort of answer to his professor’s question. It was Bior’s actual life experience.“All of us were amazed,” Knorr, assistant professor in the School of Business, said Wednesday afternoon on the second floor of the University Center. “I promised him that I would try to do something with that movie beyond the classroom, because I wanted his experience to be shared with more people.” Tuesday night was the first of four installments of the “Spotlight on Africa” film and event series. The series’ first installment featured 31-year-old Bior and the documentary he is spotlighted in, “God Grew Tired of Us.” The documentary won the Audience Award at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival. It’s executive producer is Brad Pitt and is narrated by Nicole Kidman.Bior’s country of Sudan after it was announced all male children in the South of Sudan would be killed in 1987. The boys traveled thousands of miles from Sudan to Ethiopia, back to Sudan and finally to Kenya. He lived in a refugee camp in Kenya for 10 years before traveling to Pittsburgh.”It’s sad because when that war fell upon that country, I was five years old,” Bior said Thursday afternoon on the first floor of the University Center. “You see that I was naked. I had nothing, no food, and I tread thousands and thousands of miles.”While in Kenya, Bior studied the geography of Pittsburgh, and when he was given the opportunity to travel to the United States, he chose to live there.“[Pittsburgh] was beautiful,” Bior said.After the movie was shown in Knorr’s class, Bior saw how the film affected his classmates. He thought the experience was “awesome,” because of the mixed feelings the film gave his classmates. Some were very emotional, and others said they could take something out of it, but all shared excitement.“Some [students] even were asking themselves, ‘now when I need help, I can call my relatives, and I get it. Sometimes I need something that is not even essential for life, and I argue for it,’” Bior said. “Some have no water, no food, but they still have hope for life.”Bior believes Point Park students should gain inspiration and knowledge from the documentary, but he narrowed one thing as the most important.”You have to try hard. You have to struggle. You have to press on your plans. Don’t give up,” Bior said.BNY Mellon. Bior has a wife and two children, and he plans to some day open a school for almost 3,000 children in his home village.The “Spotlight on Africa” series is an inter-departmental collaboration between cinema production, global cultural studies and organizational leadership.All of the films were made with or featured non-govermental organizations, which tied into the organizational leadership program. They also give an authentic voice to marginalized people, according to Dede Maitre, assistant professor of cinema production. She said it really ties all three departments together.Bior when he was in the library. She was shocked to see him.“I walked, and I said, ‘Point Park has a celebrity here,” Maitre said Wednesday afternoon in the University Center. “I said, ‘I got to show this movie here.’”While Maitre and Knorr discussed how they wanted to show the movie for Bior, Knorr told Maitre she had to meet Dwight Hines, assistant professor of global cultural studies.”I immediately thought Dwight is going to embrace this,” Knorr said. “He’s probably going to open our minds. Not just the students, but myself and Dede [Maitre] and beyond that.”Hines said the global cultural studies program was very excited for the series. Part of the program’s purpose is to expand the opportunities of students to see different parts of the world. He thought the series was a perfect confluence between the digital arts program and the global cultural studies program.”This is right up our alley,” Hines said Wednesday afternoon in the University Center.