internationalizing the ampus educators 2012 · 4 internat ionalizing the campus 2012 we are pleased...

Profiles of Success at Colleges and Universities

Campus 201

2INTERNATIONALIZING THE

2012

Sponsored by:

N A F S A | A S S O C I A T I O N O F I N T E R N A T I O N A L E D U C A T O R S

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EditorJan Steiner

Design + ProductionCheryl Denise Collins

Photography + Research + WritingChristopher Connell

All photographs for the Spotlight Awards were provided by the respective schools.

© Copyright 2012 by NAFSA: Association of International Educators. All rights reserved.

Reproduction of NAFSA Publications is strictly prohibited without the written permission of the publisher. Printed in the United States.

Digital Color ReprintsReprints of individual school profiles for promotional use are available. To order reprints, or additional copies of this book, please call:

NAFSA Publications 1.866.538.1927

NAFSA: ASSOCIATION OF INTERNA-TIONAL EDUCATORS has championed the cause of international education and exchange for more than 60 years, sup-porting the belief that students with international experience and a global perspec tive are crucial to the survival of the modern world. Committed to build-ing the skills, knowledge, and profes-sional competencies of its members, NAFSA strengthens international educa-tion’s biggest asset—the professionals who make educational exchange pos-sible. Today, NAFSA has nearly 10,000 members from all 50 states and more than 150 countries. Our members share a belief that international education ad-vances learning and scholarship, builds respect among different peoples, and enhances constructive leadership in a global community.

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Profiles of Success at Colleges and Universities

Campus 201

2INTERNATIONALIZING THE

2012

Sponsored by:

N A F S A | A S S O C I A T I O N O F I N T E R N A T I O N A L E D U C A T O R S

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2 InternatIonalIzIng the CAMPUS 2012

NAFSA acknowledges and is very appreciative of the considerable work of five volunteers who constituted the selection jury responsible for choosing the institutions profiled in Internationalizing the Campus 2012:

Gil lAtz (chair), Portland State University

Peter CoClANiS, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

tHomAS D’AGoStiNo, Hobart & William Smith Colleges

PAUl mCVeiGH, Northern Virginia Community College

WooDY PeltoN, elon University

their careful review of the nominations and thorough deliberations were truly invaluable.

this report was researched and written by Christopher Connell, formerly the national education reporter for the Associated Press (AP), and later assistant chief of the AP Washington Bureau. mr. Connell is a freelance writer, editor, and consultant who works with foundations, nonprofit organizations, and govern-ment agencies. He also contributed many of the fine photographs accompanying the profile articles on the Senator Paul Simon Award winners.

many thanks go to the representatives of the colleges and universities who participated in the project, including all who submitted nominations. We especially thank the institutions featured in this report for their assistance in helping us research and report their stories.

We continue to be indebted to the family of Paul Simon for lending the late senator’s name to the Sena-tor Paul Simon Award for Campus internationalization and the Senator Paul Simon Spotlight Awards,

bestowed upon the five and three institu-tions, respectively, in the 2012 report.

Internationalizing the Campus reports from previous years and information about the competition can be viewed online at www.nafsa.org/itc.

aCKnoWleDgMentS

LEFT TO RIGHT:

The 2012 Senator Paul Simon Award Jury poses with NAFSA’s Deputy Executive Director for Professional Development Services (left to right): Paul McVeigh, Judy Judd-Price (NAFSA), Thomas D’Agostino, Gil Latz (chair), Peter Coclanis, and Woody Pelton.

NAFSA gratefully acknowledges Hobsons, a NAFSA Global Partner, for underwriting the Internationalizing the Campus 2012 report.

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3ProFIleS oF SUCCeSS at CollegeS anD UnIVerSItIeS

the 2012 Senator PaUl SIMon aWarD For CaMPUS InternatIonalIzatIon

6 14 22 30 38

ContentS

48 52 56

6College of Saint Benedict/Saint John’s UniversityA Well-Coordinated Approach to Internationalization

14Juniata CollegeFaculty Discovered the World and Students Followed

22Northern Arizona UniversityAccelerates Global Learning at Home and Abroad

30San Francisco State UniversityShines in Long-Term Study Abroad

38University of MichiganStamps Its Block Letter M on Far Corners of the World

48Providence CollegeGlobal Studies a Major Draw at Providence College

52University of ArizonaBuilds a PhD Pipeline for Latin American Students

56Washington and Jefferson CollegeStudents Carve Own Path on Magellans

Senator PaUl SIMon SPotlIght aWarDS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 INTRODUCTION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

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We are pleased to present our tenth annual report, Internationalizing the Campus: Profiles of Success at Colleges and Universities, which profiles the institutions selected to receive this year’s Senator Paul Simon Award for Campus internationalization. the report cites exemplary practices, model approaches, and key trends related to international education on these outstanding U.S. campuses.

in seeking out institutions where international education has been broadly infused into all facets of the institution, the 2012 selection committee (listed on p. 2) was particularly focused on identifying institutions and programs with the following characteristics:

• the campus has been widely internationalized across schools, divisions, departments, and disciplines.

• there is evidence of genuine administrative or even board-level support for internationalization.

• the campus-wide internationalization has had demonstrable results for students.

• the institution’s mission or planning documents contain an explicit or implicit statement regard-ing international education.

• the institution’s commitment to internationalization is reflected in the curriculum.

• the campus-wide internationalization has had demonstrable results within the faculty.

• there is an international dimension in off-campus programs and outreach.

• there is internationalization in research and/or faculty exchange.

• the institution supports education abroad as well as its international faculty, scholars, and students.

NAFSA received many outstanding nominations from a diverse group of distinguished institutions across the United States. each of the five institutions chosen by the selection committee—College of Saint Benedict/Saint John’s University in minnesota, Juniata College in Pennsylvania, Northern Arizona University, San Francisco State University, and the University of michigan—is profiled in this report. NAFSA will present the award to these institutions at a special ceremony on November 13, 2012, in Washington, DC, as part of this year’s international education Week events.

IntroDUCtIon P R O F I L E S

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5ProFIleS oF SUCCeSS at CollegeS anD UnIVerSItIeS

three other institutions received the Senator Paul Simon Spotlight Award and are featured for their outstanding accomplishments in specific areas of internationalization. Providence College in rhode island is recognized for its major in Global Studies; the University of Arizona is recognized for its latin American Summer research Program for underrepresented undergraduate students; and Washington and Jefferson College in Pennsylvania is recognized for developing its magellan Project Program.

the late Senator Paul Simon served illinois and the nation as a strong voice for civil rights, peace initiatives, and international understanding. throughout his career he was a dedicated advocate for international education, using his positions on various committees in the Senate to advocate for ex-change. His leadership in this area was especially evident in his robust support, along with Senator David Boren of oklahoma, for the creation of the National Security education Program, which addresses critical national security deficiencies in language and cultural expertise, and his advocacy for legislation to enact the recommendations of the Commission on the Abraham lincoln Study Abroad Fellowship Program, which later led to the introduction of the Senator Paul Simon Study Abroad Act, a legislative proposal that continues to be championed by Senator Dick Durbin of illinois.

We hope that international educators will share this report with their institution’s top leadership—in-cluding their trustees—in order to underscore the value of international education and to broaden the reach of best practices in internationalization. Internationalizing the Campus is also of great value in communicating with communities beyond the campus. legislatures and government agencies may find it helpful in discussing and understanding international education and exchange. We believe once again this year that Internationalizing the Campus highlights the power of international education to advance learning and scholarship, to develop a globally competent workforce, to enhance constructive leadership in the global community, and to promote a more just and peaceful world.

Meredth M. McQuaid, JD NAFSA President and Chair of the Board of Directors

Associate Vice President and Dean, international Programs

University of minnesota

S P O T L I g h T S

Marlene M. Johnson executive Director and Ceo

NAFSA: Association of international educators

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Class change at Saint John’s University.

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INTERNATIONALIZING THE CAMPUS 2012 | PROFILES OF SUCCESS AT COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES 7

T he separate campuses are bound by shared Benedictine values—monks founded Saint John’s in 1856 and nuns opened Saint Benedict in 1913.

Saint John’s recently named its first lay presi-dent, Michael Hemesath, an alumnus and Carlton College professor of economics, and shifted to lay control, as the sisters did half a century ago. Father Bob Koopmann, the last Benedictine president of Saint John’s, said the values won’t change. He ex-pressed pride that the two schools have been able to partner since 1965 without one engulfing the other. “It hasn’t been easy over the years because Saint Ben’s was smaller—now they’re bigger—and within the Catholic Church men dominated and still do. But the fact that we could work it out is just wonderful,” said Koopmann, a concert pianist, music professor, and alumnus.

A MORE SEAMLESS APPROACH TO INTERNATIONALIZATIONSixty percent of the 2,000 “Bennies,” as the female students are known, and 45 percent of the 1,900 “Johnnies” study abroad, most on one of the col-leges’ 17 semester-long programs on a half-dozen continents. Sixteen of these programs are led by faculty. In addition, the schools offer up to a dozen

Amid the woods, lakes, and prairies of Central Minnesota, the College of Saint Benedict

(CSB) for women and Saint John’s University (SJU) for men provide a liberal arts educa-

tion suffused with international experiences and coursework. Saint Benedict and Saint

John’s ranked first among baccalaureate institutions in semester-long education abroad

and 13th in international student enrollment in the 2011 Open Doors report. The biggest

department—management—recently overhauled its curriculum and changed its name to

the Department of Global Business Leadership. CSB and SJU have one of the most unus-

ual coeducational arrangements in U.S. higher education: two campuses, four miles apart

with two presidents but a single faculty and school buses that ferry students back and forth

during half-hour breaks between 70-minute classes.

A Well-Coordinated Approach to Internationalization at

Saint Benedict and Saint John’s

summer courses overseas and arrange service and internship opportunities from Belize to Bosnia to Hong Kong.

Father Bob Koopmann, concert pianist and the last Benedictine monk to serve as president of Saint John’s, says the values won’t change.

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LEFT TO RIGHT:

Joseph Rogers, an alumnus, attorney, and East Asia expert, is the first director of the Center for Global Education.

Peggy Retka, director of education abroad, says “we stick with our own programs” for curricular reasons.

it’s expensive to dispatch so many faculty around the world. “it has some challenging attributes,” said College of Saint Benedict President maryAnn Baenninger, but this approach makes it easy for students to study abroad “with little detrimental challenge to their curriculum.” it is also “the only model that lets you change the international ex-perience of your faculty in a wholesale way after they arrive.”

Nonetheless, the Saint Benedict president sees “a very big danger in equating internationalization with study abroad.” especially since making inter-nationalization one of three cornerstones of a 2010 strategic plan, the colleges have shifted emphasis from student mobility to a more comprehensive ap-proach. “We’re developing more of a seamlessness on what it means to be global, but we’re not there yet,” said Baenninger, a psychologist. “We have to constantly poke ourselves and remind ourselves that just counting study abroad numbers isn’t what it’s all about. it’s what other activities students vol-untarily choose to engage in and how they interpret difference and the ‘other.’” it is tempting for the 80 percent of students from minnesota “to think that they and their culture are the norm,” she said. “You have to come at that in every which way.”

A PART FOR EVERyONEJoseph rogers, director of the Center for Global education, echoed those sentiments. internation-alization “has to be embedded in all aspects of the college. it can’t reside just in study abroad or in-ternational student programming. everyone has to feel they have a part to play in internationalization, from faculty who teach mathematics and the natu-ral sciences to student development professionals in the residence halls,” he said.

rogers, an attorney and east Asia expert, led a semester program in China in 2006 for his alma mater, stayed on as director of education abroad, and was tapped to run the new Center for Global education in 2010. Peggy retka, his successor as director of education abroad, said, “We stick with our own programs because that allows us to build the academic offerings around our common cur-riculum, and so, almost every student can fit a semester abroad into their four-year plan. that’s good for our faculty and good for our students’ participation rate.” each student on the faculty-led semester programs takes a four-credit study abroad seminar to fulfill an intercultural and experiential learning study requirement.

in the years leading up to creation of the Center for Global education, top administrators already were pushing to professionalize study abroad operations

President MaryAnn Baenninger has led dozens of Saint Benedict students to a women’s leadership conference in Dubai.

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LEFT TO RIGHT:

Vice Provost Joseph DesJardins says international students are not visitors, and are treated the same as U.S. students.

Chemistry Professor Henry Jakubowski listens to Mandarin tapes on his bicycle commute to campus.

and make them less dependent on the proclivities of individual faculty. “Some faculty thought they were losing ownership of the programs,” said Vice Provost Joseph DesJardins. “there were some tough times but those conversations really matured the community.” DesJardins credited rogers and retka with allaying those concerns “by making decisions in a real collaborative way.” A 12-person advisory council composed of faculty and administrators now provides the vehicle for that collaboration.

GROWING INTEREST IN CHINA, JAPAN, AND INDIArogers has moved to expand partnerships with insti-tutions around the world and cement ties that began with those individual faculty contacts. one of the

oldest and deepest partnerships is with Southwest University in Beibei, China, which stretches back to 1986. A faculty development trip to east Asia a decade later whetted chemistry professor Henry Jakubowski’s interest in Chinese medicine. He went on to lead the China semester program twice and teach an honors senior seminar, “medicine: east meets West.” He also had a hand in creating a summer exchange that allows 16 students from both countries to conduct research for six weeks in China and then six weeks in minnesota. “it’s a fan-tastic way to build relationships,” said Jakubowski, who listens to mandarin tapes through a speaker mounted on his bicycle as he pedals to work.

the colleges launched an Asian studies major in 2009 and expanded Chinese and Japanese language

Queuing at Saint John’s for the buses to Saint Benedict.

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instruction with the help of a $140,000 U.S. Depart-ment of education title Vi grant. A semester study program in Kolkata, india, was launched in 2011, thanks to the efforts of english department chair madhu mitra and other faculty with roots in that area. mitra led the first group of students to Kolkata and even landed novelist Amitav Ghosh as a guest lecturer. it took three years and three faculty devel-opment trips to india to make that new program happen. “We did our homework,” said Provost rita Knuesel. “i wanted to make sure i could look at two presidents and say, ‘We are ready to go.’” An economics professor, Sucharita Sinha mukherjee, led the program in 2012, and mitra will take the class to Kolkata again next spring. But mitra said, “We’re really hoping that the next time (2014), a

non-indian faculty member will lead this course. it will be completely unsustainable if it’s just people from india.”

Junior Kia marie lor, 20, of St. Paul, the daughter of Hmong immigrants and recipient of a Gates millennium Scholarship, jumped at the oppor-tunity to study in Kolkata, but first had some convincing to do at home. “my mom was really upset. She was like, ‘Are you dropping out of col-lege?’” the communication major related. “i told her, ‘No, i am just studying abroad.’ to a Hmong mother that is completely bizarre. in the Hmong language there is no word for study abroad.” But she won her mother over and later spent a second semester in China.

LEFT TO RIGHT:

English Chair Madhu Mitra helped lure a world-famous author to her study abroad class in Kolkata, India.

Lisa Scott advises international students, including one whose artwork decorates Scott’s office.

Kingshuk Mukherjee in the newly renamed Department of Global Business Leadership—formerly management—tells students there is no escape from the globalization of commerce.

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Since 1989 more than 1,200 Japanese high school students have attended a summer eSl program at CSB and SJU, which grew out of an enrichment program for U.S. high schoolers that history professor David Bennetts had organized. “that was the start of my venture into things in-ternational,” said Bennetts, who taught January courses in Japan seven times, started a semes-ter exchange with Bunkyo Gakuin University in tokyo, and created a U.S. history course for in-ternational students.

A SEMESTER-LONG ORIENTATION COURSEthe colleges enrolled 252 international students in 2010–11, or six percent of enrollment. they are drawn by the availability of financial aid and schol-arships that range from $4,000 to $19,000 a year. Vice Provost DesJardins said, “they are not visi-tors. it’s not ‘them.’ they’re us. if a kid is coming from Japan, they are going to be treated the same way for financial aid purposes as the kids coming from Chicago.”

international students take a 12-week cultural ac-ademic orientation course in their first semester in addition to the standard three-day orientation that all new students attend. lisa Scott, the aca-demic adviser who co-teaches the classes, said, “one of my very first lectures is about explaining the liberal arts and understanding why you’re

here and what the liberal arts means to you.” For students interested only in business, “that’s a hard one to swallow at first so we come back to it again and again,” Scott said. “that ongoing ori-entation class is a real gift,” said Alex Schleper, director of the international Student Program of-fice and a onetime Saint John’s quarterback who shares the instructional duties.

the colleges tapped the brakes on recruitment in China after an outsized entering class—50 in-stead of the usual 25—encountered difficulties in 2009–10. “they weren’t as successful in their first year as we had hoped they would be,” said Baenninger. the number reverted to normal for

“They are not visitors. It’s not ‘them.’ They’re us. If a kid is coming from Japan, they are going to be treated the same way for financial aid purposes as the kids coming from Chicago.

”

Student workers at the international student program office.

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Alex Schleper, director of the International Student Program Office.

Longtime Director of International Admissions Roger young.

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2010. the lesson, said roger Young, the inter-national admission director, was that “we need to diversify. We can’t rely on China and the Ba-hamas and trinidad and not on other areas of the world.” the colleges traditionally have had a pipeline to Caribbean countries where the Bene-dictines have monasteries.

there are far more success stories than disappoint-ments. Huaweilang (Clement) Dai, 23, of Shanghai, China, graduated with a Phi Beta Kappa key and landed an internship with the Woodrow Wilson international Center for Scholars and its Kissinger institute on China and the United States. Dai, who interned previously with the American Council on renewable energy, dreams of helping his home-land make greater use of clean energy even while it builds more coal plants. “We can’t abandon fossil fuel energy overnight,” said Dai, three of whose roommates studied or traveled in China.

DOCUMENTING HUMANITARIAN ISSUESthe colleges offer students opportunities to vol-unteer in tanzania, Dominican republic, ecuador, Guatemala, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. (Forty young people from Bosnia-Herzegovina attended the col-leges on scholarships paid for by a trustee). Senior trang Pham, 23, went to Bosnia for 20 days as part of a student group called extending the link

Senior Huaweilang (Clement) Dai of Shanghai earned a Phi Beta Kappa key and helped convince three roommates to study or travel in China.

that each year travels the world to produce a doc-umentary on humanitarian issues. Hers was on recovery from the Balkan war. earlier documenta-ries addressed the plight of orphans in Uganda and human trafficking in Nepal.

it was the fifth time the Vietnam-born Pham used her passport for college-sponsored study and service, after earlier stops in Japan (may 2009), egypt and israel (may 2010), Vietnam (summer 2010), and China and Hong Kong (winter 2010). She was one of the e-Scholars—“e” for entre-preneur—who are groomed to create socially conscious business ventures.

Students can earn credit following el Camino de Santiago de Compostela (or Way of Saint James), the pilgrims’ route in Spain. the late Jose Antonio Fabres, a professor of Hispanic Studies, said that class provides “a very humbling” experience for col-lege students: being on the receiving end of help. “in a lot of programs students do things for others. in this program others do things for them. they get help from strangers when their blisters become un-bearable,” explained the Chilean-born Fabres in an interview weeks before his death from cancer.

Baenninger has launched a program that has taken dozens of Saint Benedict students to the Women as Global leaders Conference in the United Arab emirates, where the president serves on the board of trustees of American University of Sharjah.

Senior Trang Pham of Maple Grove, Minnesota, flew to Bosnia to make a documentary with a student group about the long recovery from the Balkan civil war.

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l e S S o n S learnedFACULTY DEVELOPMENT. Seventy-five faculty have participated in development trips to 11 countries in the past five years, many underwritten by a trustee convinced of the importance of encouraging professors to think globally in their teaching and research. The colleges also sponsor two trips to Italy and Germany each year for faculty and staff to learn more about the Benedictine heritage.

NO HALF MEASURES. Management faculty scrapped their department’s name and gave it a new one: Global Business Leadership. All sophomores in the college’s most popular major must take four global business courses instead of one. “It’s very ex-citing,” said Kingshuk Mukherjee, a former textile marketing executive turned academic. “We’ve integrated internships into the system, too.” Minnesotans love their home state, he said, “but if you go to work for 3M or the Targets or General Mills, or even small companies, you have to deal with China, India, and Latin America. There is no escape.”

SUSTAINABILITY. Some of the colleges’ longest overseas partnerships grew out of a single professor’s contacts and passionate interests. But ties need to be deep enough to outlast retirements, said Provost Rita Knuesel. “The entrepreneur’s spirit is good, but you have to think about sustainability, sustainability, sustainability.”

EXPANDING OPPORTUNITIES. Center for Global Education Director Joseph Rogers hopes to give more students from more departments opportunities to engage in research overseas like the science exchange with Southwest University in China. Internships also are of growing importance. Twenty students now get support for intern-ships abroad and Rogers wants to double that number. “That’s the next frontier for us: deeper engagement with our partners and creating programming that allows students to engage with international issues in a variety of ways that meet their interests and their goals.”

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Mid-morning between classes, outside the Halbritter Center for the Performing Arts.

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InternatIonalIzIng the CAMPUS 2012 | ProFIleS oF SUCCeSS at CollegeS anD UnIVerSItIeS 15

H e is not alone in finding ready sup-port for internationalizing courses and the entire experience at Juniata, a lib-eral arts college with 1,600 students

tucked in the Appalachian mountains in the cen-tral Pennsylvania town of Huntingdon. Juniata was founded in 1876 as the first of a half dozen colleges associated with the pacifist Church of the Breth-ren. it is independent but still part of a network of Brethren colleges. most past presidents were church ministers and a fraction of current faculty and students are members. the Brethren heritage is manifest most strongly in its peace and conflict studies program and in the meditative “Peace Cha-pel,” a circular ring of stones set on a nearby hilltop designed by architect maya lin. traditionally its

Political scientist Emil Nagengast was hired by Juniata College in 1996 to teach internation-

al politics, with Europe and the former East Germany—he’d studied at Karl Marx University

in Leipzig shortly before the Berlin Wall fell—his special province. But in 2004, with a con-

science pricked by complaints from two former, African-born students about the Eurocen-

tricity of his course, he spent a sabbatical in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, examining the work-

ings of the fledgling African Union. The next year, with guidance and help from a Washing-

ton & Jefferson College professor who had already begun taking students to The Gambia,

Nagengast led four Juniata students to Senegal and The Gambia for three weeks. In 2008

Juniata and other colleges in Pennsylvania formed a Keystone Study Away Consortium to

offer a full semester at the University of The Gambia. Nagengast, or Nags as students call

him, now has led eight summer trips to The Gambia and launched a winter class as well.

He calculates that 135 Juniata students to date have studied in The Gambia over summer

and 31 in spring semester. His Introduction to International Politics course now devotes as

much time to the African Union as it does to the European Union (one week). Of his mid-

career switch in interests, Nagengast recalls that when he broached the idea of education

abroad in West Africa, administrators “just said, ‘Interesting. Go do it.’ They trusted me.”

Juniata College

Political Science Professor Emil Nagengast with a poster urging students to sign up for a winter class in The Gambia.

Faculty Discovered the World and Students Followed

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student body was drawn from within the borders of the Quaker State. But that is changing.

A LONG INTERNATIONAL JOURNEyJuniata set out almost two decades ago to make itself a more globally minded campus. A 1993 strategic plan identified internationalization as a top priority and urged the recruitment of more in-ternational students. the next year it opened an intensive english Program to help attract them to Huntingdon. Juniata in 2004 joined the American Council on education (ACe) internationalization Collaborative, and its 2008 strategic plan embraced a goal of raising international enrollments from 6 to 10 percent. it reached that mark swiftly, with 166 students on visas on campus in 2011–12, in-cluding 50 from China. President thomas Kepple said he would gladly see that percentage double to 20 percent so long as Juniata’s overall enrollment keeps growing as it has on his watch, from 1,200 in 1998 to the current 1,600. Juniata’s out-of-state enrollment has doubled to 40 percent.

“it’s becoming a better place. it’s hard work in ad-missions, basically,” said Kepple, who will retire in may 2013. Students are drawn in part by Juniata’s generous financial aid for both domestic and inter-national applicants. Dean of Admissions michelle Bartol said, “We’re never coasting. right now with China recruitment, everyone else is kind of catch-ing up. We’ve got to stay one step ahead.”

the college, which boasts an alumnus with a Nobel Prize in physics (William Phillips ’70), is particu-larly strong in the sciences and sends dozens of graduates to medical and graduate schools. For in-ternational parents, “the sales pitch is they already know people who’ve sent their children here and

they’ve done well,” said Kepple. “Ninety percent of our Chinese students graduate. that’s larger than our U.S. student number.”

LANGUAGE HOUSES AND A GLOBAL VILLAGEDean of international education Jenifer Cushman and rosalie rodriguez, the college’s chief diver-sity officer, returned from an ACe Bridging the Gap Symposium in 2008 determined to find new ways to change the face of the college and encour-age more students to encounter and reflect upon cultural differences. they came up with a Global

Dean of Admissions Michelle Bartol says Juniata is never coasting on international recruitment.

President Thomas Kepple has seen international and domestic enrollments increase dramatically during his watch.

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engagement initiative that included the creation of a residential Global Village that features an intercultural floor for a mix of international and domestic students within a larger dorm.

Clarissa Diniz, a pre-med student from recife, Brazil, said it was “really cool” living there as a freshman. She stayed on as a resident adviser for sophomore year. Diniz, daughter of two math pro-fessors, has a brother who graduated from UClA, but was happy with her small town choice. “this is a really good community. People are really nice and welcoming, the professors remember your name and their office is always open.”

Also as part of the Global Village, several small houses on campuses are being turned into Spanish, French, and German houses where students live to-gether to improve their language skills. Sophomore rebekah Sheeler from Boyertown, Pennsylvania, was programming coordinator for the newly opened Spanish House in 2011–12. “the other stu-dents call me the mom,” laughed Sheeler, who was drawn to Juniata to play field hockey but dropped the sport after a year in part to pursue interna-tional education interests. She combined classes and an internship in orizaba, mexico, in summer

2011, spent fall 2011 at a university in Quito, ecua-dor, and will intern at a wildlife reserve in Peru in spring 2013.

A THIRST FOR LANGUAGES WITHOUT A REQUIREMENTJuniata has no language requirement beyond two years in high school for admission. the college jettisoned a stronger requirement in the 1970s, and an effort in 1996 to reinstate it fell a few votes short. But Professor of Spanish Henry thur-ston-Griswold said, “When i came in 1992, we averaged 50 students per semester taking Span-ish. Now we have more than triple that number.” Juniata is home to the much-honored language in motion program, which deploys international

Professor Henry Thurston-Griswold says Spanish language enrollments have tripled without a requirement.

“This is a really good community. People are

really nice and welcoming, the professors remember your name and their

office is always open.

”

Sophomore Clarissa Diniz from Recife, Brazil, was a resident adviser in the new Global Village.

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students and study abroad returnees to local K–12 classrooms where they present language lessons and cultural activities. language in motion, led by Deborah roney, has taken root at 13 other colleges and universities.

Juniata offers French, German, and russian as well as Spanish and two years of Chinese. “the dif-ficulty with languages other than Spanish is we’re basically one-person programs,” said michael Hen-derson, chair of world languages and associate professor of French. “obviously offering an upper division course in French critical theory is not a good idea…. my main motivation is to get students in my classes to study abroad.”

in the 1980s Juniata exchanged as many as 20 sci-ence majors each year with the Catholic University of lille in France and the University of marburg in Germany. Chemistry Professor ruth reed, a for-mer Fulbright scholar in Germany, championed the exchanges, which later dropped off. She saw one downside to sending so many Juniata students to lille and marburg. “if you send too many, then you defeat the purpose. You have this little clique that doesn’t integrate. We can be too successful,” said the retiring chemistry professor.

While reed’s passion came early, Gerald Kruse, a professor of math and computer science, was farther along in his career when he had a

LEFT TO RIGHT:

World Languages Chair and Associate Professor Michael Henderson.

Computer Science Professor Gerald Kruse exchanged class and home with a German colleague.

Two German exchange students (right) and professor Thomas Weik (center) from Juniata partner Münster University of Applied Sciences joined Juniata counterparts at a seminar.

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serendipitous meeting with thomas Weik, a com-puter science professor at Juniata partner muenster University of Applied Sciences in Germany. they wound up swapping homes and classes for fall 2006. “it was just a fantastic experience. i went over as a passive supporter (of education abroad) and came back as a very active promoter,” said Kruse, who now serves on Juniata’s international education Committee.

AN ENGAGED FACULTy AND TWO ADVISERS Almost half the class of 2011 studied abroad, many on the 20 education abroad courses led by Juni-ata professors. Juniata has exchange partners in 19 countries. “our success at this didn’t start at the top,” said Provost James lasko. “Faculty who had international contacts were largely responsible for this exchange model. Sometimes administra-tors just have to know when to get out of the way and give your people a little latitude to run with a good idea.” Cushman, the dean of international education and associate professor of German, said, “Faculty involvement and engagement really are the heart of our international programs. Faculty members go above and beyond. every time my office takes a step, it’s in conjunction with faculty.”

Juniata has 102 full-time and 48 part-time faculty, and each student has two academic advisers, one for their Program of emphasis (Poe)—Juniata’s interdisciplinary alternative to majors—and an-other from a second discipline to offer a different perspective. the advice includes strong encourage-ment to study abroad.

most students choose straightforward business, sci-ence, and humanities concentrations, but three in 10 chart new pathways to their bachelor’s degrees.

Brianne rowan, 22, from Port townsend, Wash-ington, fashioned her Poe around global health issues. She spent three summers doing volunteer work in thailand with a humanitarian group from her hometown, spent junior year abroad in lille, France, and twice went on two-week service trips with Juniata’s Habitat for Humanity chapter to build homes for the poor in Yerevan, Armenia, and in el Salvador.

megan russell, 22, a senior from Belle Vernon, Pennsylvania, and a Habitat for Humanity leader, learned on Nagengast’s 2011 trip to the Gambia that “things do not always go as planned. Some-times a pipe breaks in your room or scorpions are chasing you around, but it’s all part of the experi-ence.” the aspiring physical therapist came back from Gambia and organized a fundraiser to buy solar panels for a rural hospital.

GROWING PAINS AND ESSAyS ON THE RADIOthere have been growing pains with the rapid climb in international enrollments, especially the spurt in the number of students from China. His-tory professor David Sowell, a former international education director, said, “our big challenge now is how do we integrate them? We have the Global Village; we have lots and lots of student groups. How do we use programming and those groups to draw students into that intercultural exchange?”

Doug Stiffler, an associate professor of history and east Asia specialist, sees that already happening. When Stiffler and spouse Jingxia Yang, now the Chinese language instructor, came to Juniata in 2002, “there was one student from mainland China and a handful of ethnic Chinese students. it was a pretty homogenous place, albeit with a

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Provost James Lasko.

Doug Stiffler, an associate professor of history and East Asia specialist.

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great commitment to international education,” said Stiffler. “over five or six years, we saw that number change to 50 Chinese students. For us, it’s a wonderful thing.”

the influx has boosted enrollments in Juniata’s intensive english Program. instructor Gretchen Ketner, a National Public radio fan, found an un-usual way to help students hone writing skills and adjust to U.S. college life. She assigned them to write “this i Believe” essays for the Penn State public radio station, WPSU. Nearly a dozen have gotten on the air.

Separately, Stiffler did an on-air interview for that station’s “StoryCorps” broadcast with a freshman from Chengdu, China, who wrote in Ketner’s class about his admiration for lin zhao, a student leader in Beijing during the Hundred Flowers movement in 1956 when mao zedong briefly encouraged citi-zens to speak freely. She was imprisoned in 1960, but wrote about freedom and democracy in her letters and diary—some in her own blood—until her execution in 1968. “She’s a real hero,” the busi-ness student told Stiffler. “our government and our school never talk about this…. i want to learn something about America. i want to teach people what is liberty, what is freedom, what we can do in this special time.”

Kati Csoman, assistant dean of international educa-tion, said that in addition to the regular orientation, all new international students can join the U.S. freshman in “inbound” retreats built around such activities as backpacking, hiking, cooking, the arts

and exploring spirituality, pop culture, and other topics. the students choose from more than 30 tracks. two peer leaders assisted by faculty or staff shepherd the new students in groups of 10 through the three-day experience. “the idea is to bring to-gether students across their interests, but then also help them make friendships and learn about the college,” said Csoman.

Dean Jenifer Cushman and Kati Csoman outside Oller Center, home to international programs and peace studies.

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l e S S o n S learnedIS IT WORKING? Juniata has formed an intercultural learning assessment com-mittee and begun using a Web-based survey developed by the Great Lakes College Association to measure the learning outcomes from education abroad. Students are surveyed before departure and upon their return. “Assessment is the next big area for us,” said Dean Jenifer Cushman.

STUDY ABROAD SITE VISITS. Each spring Juniata sends up to a dozen faculty and staff overseas to visit study abroad sites and partner universities. “Since advising is such a core part of the institution, these trips help faculty members better advise students headed to these sites,” said Cushman. The visits have the added advantage of helping the faculty understand the courses and curriculum at exchange students’ home universities.

NOT A FINANCIAL BOON. Private colleges seeking to boost international en-rollments for financial reasons may be in for a surprise. “We spend the same amount on an international student as we spend on a U.S. student,” said President Thomas Kepple. “The Chinese and others have figured out there’s financial aid.” There’s also the expense of running the international office and offering ESL and other services. “It’s a complicated business. It’s not a windfall,” Kepple said.

THINK COLLABORATIVELY. Juniata was able to quickly launch a successful semester abroad program in The Gambia by collaborating with five colleges in its region. “You don’t have to do this entirely on your own,” said Provost James Lasko. “Having a good program in Africa is really important to us, and this is a relatively inexpensive way to do it. You only have to give up a semester of a faculty member’s time once every six years.” Juniata also finds it advantageous to encourage students to go on exchanges rather than third-party programs.

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Students stream past the Lumberjack statue at noontime.

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Arizona’s third-largest university, perched beneath the scenic San Francisco Peaks in Flagstaff, already was deeply involved in study and

research across the American Southwest—the 27,000-square mile Navajo Nation is next door. the global engagement push has it looking even farther. the university made global engagement a strategic priority and hired Harvey Charles as vice provost for international affairs and director of the Center for international education. Charles earlier directed international education offices at Wheaton College in massachusetts, Georgia tech, and San Francisco State University. President John Haeger and Provost liz Grobsmith convened the task Force for Global education in 2008 and charged it with crafting a blueprint for transform-ing NAU into a global campus and ensuring that graduates were ready to compete in a global econ-omy. While 18 faculty and administrators formed the nucleus of the task force, 30 other faculty and the then-mayor of Flagstaff, Joe Donaldson, served on five subcommittees (the mayor was on the community engagement panel). they came up with numerous ways to embed global learning throughout academic majors, general education courses, and cocurricular activities. “it is our hope that students will have multiple and substantive encounters (as opposed to merely a one-course

The strides that Northern Arizona University (NAU) is making on all fronts in international

education—doubling international enrollments, tripling participation in education abroad,

marshaling enthusiastic faculty support for a Global Learning Initiative that will infuse

more global content into the curriculum discipline by discipline—shows what a commit-

ted institution can do even under exacting budgetary circumstances. NAU has raised its

international profile and activities even while dealing with the loss of a third of its state aid

($60 million) over four years. Part of its success stems from finding a novel way to finance

the Global Learning Initiative, coupled with strong leadership and resolute support from

the top.

northern arizona

Vice Provost for International Affairs Harvey Charles stresses the importance of allowing faculty to define global learning outcomes for their own disciplines.

Accelerates global Learning at home and Abroad

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requirement) with these perspectives,” said the panel. the faculty Senate gave its blessings to the panel’s raft of recommendations in 2010.

FAST FORWARDING COURSE DEVELOPMENTAnthropologist miguel Vasquez recalled a meeting to winnow four dozen faculty proposals in the run-ning for $4,000 seed grants to develop new courses. “Harvey walked in and said, ‘let’s make this easy. i want to award every one of these grants because this is what we’re trying to do on this campus. We’ve got the money, so let’s do it,’” said Vasquez. “it pushed the whole thing fast forward.” the university-wide belt-tightening brought on by the reductions in state appropriations actually whetted faculty appetites for the global initiative, said Blase Scarnati, director of the Global learning initiative. “things started mov-ing around the table, and that kind of kinetic energy made a lot of innovative things possible.”

each department was charged with defining global learning outcomes for its own discipline. “instead of having a university-wide commit-tee telling everybody how to do global learning, we’ve given the responsibility to the faculty themselves,” explained Charles. “instead of ge-neric global learning outcomes, we’re talking about global learning outcomes in the language of physics, dental hygiene, electronic media and film, engineering.”

LOOKING AT THE WORLD THROUGH SUSTAINABILITy, DIVERSITy LENSESthe faculty also were pressed to realign the cur-riculum in ways that buttressed three bedrock NAU values: sustainability, diversity, and global engage-ment. Charles launched a twice-a-year, 20-page magazine, NAU Global, that explained the changes ahead and shone a beacon on the extensive study and research that faculty and students were under-taking overseas.

Scarnati, a musicologist, said even minor course adjustments “can have quite a dramatic impact” on internationalizing the curriculum. Assigning civil engineering students to design a bridge for Kenya instead of Arizona requires the same complex math calculations, but also forces students to weigh “all sorts of cultural issues in terms of materials and workforce management,” Scarnati said. When pro-fessors and students looked closely, global issues hit closer to home than some realized. in Scarnati’s own department, awareness grew about the threats that development poses to the African blackwood trees that provide the wood to make oboes and other woodwinds.

it will take time to see some changes bear fruit. Starting in fall 2012, a five-year Global Science and engineer Program (GSeP) offers science and engineering majors the opportunity to spend a full year studying and interning abroad and to earn a second bachelor’s degree in French, German, or

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Provost Liz Grobsmith found new revenue streams for international programs.

Global Learning Initiative Director Blase Scarnati says the emphasis on curricular changes struck a chord with faculty.

“Instead of generic global learning outcomes, we’re talking about global learning outcomes in the language of physics, dental hygiene, electronic media and film, engineering.

”

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Spanish (or a minor in Chinese and Japanese). it is modeled after the University of rhode island’s groundbreaking dual-degree program. eck Doerry, an associate professor of computer science who used to take rising sophomores on “icebreaker” summer trips to Germany, said, “engineers are going to have to change how they behave.”

GLOBAL ENGAGEMENT OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOMPaul trotta, professor of civil and environmental engineering and adviser to the engineers Without Borders (eWB) chapter, led students on service trips to a village in Ghana to build a solar-powered water station and perform other work, including

building quarters for a village nurse. they un-dertook the latter after village leaders identified their most pressing need not as more solar power, but as lodging, to convince the government to send them a nurse. When an engineering student came down with malaria, an anthropology stu-dent stepped up to manage construction. it wasn’t applied anthropology, but “what a wonderful experience she had,” said trotta. eWB also has undertaken wastewater projects on the island of roatán, 30 miles off the coast of Honduras. “We need projects closer to home,” said trotta, who noted it costs as much to fly one student to Ghana as it does to build a well.

leslie Schulz, executive dean of the College of Health and Human Services, led a December 2011 service trip to a tibetan refugee camp in mainpat, india. Schulz, a nutritionist and diabetes research-er, brought a dozen faculty and students—dental hygienists, engineers, and sustainable community experts—on the journey that began with two days of flying and an arduous 17-hour bus ride. they dwelled for eight days in a Buddhist monastery and, with other Flagstaff volunteers, fanned out to seven refugee camps providing care, mapping needs, and trying to improve the spotty electricity supply. Schulz brought the leader of the mainpat community to Flagstaff in may 2012 to help con-vince other NAU colleges to pitch in on future trips. Her only criterion for who goes is that each must be able “to contribute something to the commu-nity, not just study people.”

SURGE IN INTERNATIONAL ENROLLMENTNAU’s international enrollments have nearly dou-bled since 2008, paced by a surge in students from

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Computer Science Professor Eck Doerry coordinates a new dual engineering and language degree program.

Mandy Hansen, director of international admissions, says international undergraduates get admission decisions in 72 hours.

Feng (Bruce) Wang came as a business exchange student and stayed to work on its China Program Initiatives and earn a master’s degree.

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China and Saudi Arabia. its intensive english pro-gram “had a huge bump in enrollment,” from 90 students in spring 2009 to 220 in fall 2010, said Wil-liam Crawford, director and associate professor of linguistics. the program recently expanded into a former elementary school building; the playground, still equipped with slides, is now a designated smoking area.

mandy Hansen, director of international admis-sions and associate director of the Center for international education, said NAU’s size and lo-cale is a draw. Sunny Flagstaff has a population of 60,000 and, at 6,900 feet elevation, stays cooler in summer than Phoenix. “in a smaller town like Flagstaff and a midsize school, they can find their place. Parents feel really comfortable sending their students here,” said Hansen. Catherine ribic, di-rector of international students and scholars, said some “are unhappy when they get here, but then they’re unhappy to leave.”

NAU was an original participant in an American Association of State Colleges and Universities initiative to promote dual degrees with Chinese universities, and it now has agreements with four dozen universities for a variety of 2+2, 1+2+1, and 1+3 programs. Four of the 35 staff members of the Center for international education work on the China initiatives. Among them is graduate student Bruce Feng Wang, who originally came to NAU on a 2+2 exchange from Beijing inter-national Studies University. As a junior business major, Wang was part of a student delegation that met Warren Buffett in omaha, Nebraska. He even got to question the legendary investor about his decision to invest in a Chinese electric car company—an investment that subsequently turned sour. “NAU has really valued interna-tional education,” said Wang. “i have friends who went to bigger universities, but they don’t provide the resources for international students that NAU does.”

An intensive English instructor and students from Saudi Arabia.

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GRABBING EVERy OPPORTUNITythe Chinese government pays for faculty to attend what NAU calls its Scholar Academy where they learn about U.S. higher education and pedagogical approaches. Dozens of NAU faculty have lectured in China. Grobsmith allowed Charles to retain some revenues from the Scholar Academy to help fund other global activities, including the engineering dual degrees and a symposium highlighting student research. “We found a mechanism that enables him to invest in all these initiatives that have put us on the map,” said Grobsmith, who retired in June 2012 as provost and became special assistant to the president for strategic and international initiatives (the new provost is laura Huenneke, biologist and former NAU vice president for research). NAU now is looking to create dual-degree programs with universities in indonesia, india, and elsewhere. “every opportunity that comes along, we try to grab it,” said Grobsmith. “there’s just unending opportunity. there’s a tremendous value placed on American-style education, and people are hungry to get their students here.”

michelle Harris, associate professor of sociology, helped establish a dual master’s degree program with the University of Botswana. two NAU gradu-ate students spent 2011–12 in Botswana, while thembelihle Ndebele spent the year earning a mas-ter’s degree in Flagstaff. Harris said the soft-spoken Ndebele helped give Arizona students “a taste of the world” in every class she took. Ndebele spent part of her year in Flagstaff interning with Catholic Charities. “i’ve learnt a lot from this experience. it will help me go back and try to boost our child safety systems,” she said.

GO SCHOLARSHIPS AND FREQUENT SALES PITCHESStudent participation in faculty-led education abroad courses tripled in three years. So-called Go Scholarships ranging from $250 to $1,000 are helping fuel growth. Half the $100,000 awarded comes from a small fee collected by the student government from all 17,000 undergraduates. there were 20 faculty-led study trips in 2012, mostly in

summer. “We presented to 3,400 students in person in spring 2012 through class visits, information ses-sions, and fairs on campus,” said eric Deschamps, director of education abroad. NAU focuses mainly on exchanges, which puts education abroad “with-in reach of a lot of our students,” he added. Still, even with growth in education abroad offerings, only 355 NAU students studied abroad in 2010–11.

NAU serves many first-generation college stu-dents and others with little familiarity with other countries and cultures, even though mexico is just across the border. on a class for graduate students that Charles led to view student affairs operations at european universities in may 2010, more than half the participants were traditionally underrep-resented students. Among them was marvin Jim, a Navajo graduate student who works at NAU’s Native American Cultural Center. He called the trip “a defining moment in my life. We went to europe with lots of questions and came back with even more. We got out of our comfort zones.”

Thembelihle Ndebele (l.) came to NAU for a master’s degree as the first student in an exchange with the University of Botswana arranged by Associate Professor of Sociology Michelle Harris.

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Senior ruth Naegele gave up a career in supply management to start college in midlife and spent a semester at the University of South Australia on a Gilman Scholarship. it “could not have been a better experience,” said Naegele.

EARLy STAGE OF THE JOURNEyNAU is still at an early stage of this journey but is well positioned to keep accelerating its progress. Vasquez, the anthropologist, noted the Southwest “is the only place in the world where the so-called first and third worlds share a border.” Both inter-national and minority enrollments are growing. A decade ago 77 percent of students were white; now they comprise 66 percent. latino enrollment jumped almost 8 percent from 2010 to 2011, while 5 percent more international students enrolled. “this place is a wonderful laboratory for diversity,” said Vasquez. the Global learning initiative gives NAU faculty and students new opportunities to learn about the world—and themselves.

Senior Ruth Naegele won a Gilman Scholarship for her semester at the University of South Australia in Adelaide.

Engineering students practice surveying on campus.

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l e S S o n S learnedSETTING PRIORITIES. Even in tough times, leaders found new funding streams for the global engagement push, allowing the Center for International Education to retain a share of revenues from its growing initiatives in China. “We became masters of our destiny,” said Vice Provost Harvey Charles. President John Haeger observed, “You only get true innovation when you put money on the table.”

CURRICULAR EMPHASIS. From the start, NAU has made the curriculum the driver of its global education push. That curricular emphasis is more important than any “services” offered by a center for international education, Vice Provost Harvey Charles said. That stance struck a chord among faculty. “We can’t do anything about the national economy or what the legislature will do in terms of funding. What we really do as faculty is own and control curriculum,” said Blase Scarnati, director of the Global Learning Initiative. They also connected the global emphasis to longstanding campus values around sustainability and diversity, “tapping faculty in the place where it touches them deeply,” he said.

THINK FULBRIGHTS. Charles sought to dispel some “myths” about the difficulty of winning Fulbrights. Outside English-speaking countries, “the competition for the rest of the world is not as challenging as people think,” said Charles, noting that one in three applications gets funded. Five faculty won Fulbright scholarships in 2011.

STREAMLINING ADMISSIONS. NAU employed both technology and a personal touch to make it easier for international undergraduates to apply. “They don’t have to wait eight months to know if they’re admitted or their applications were reviewed,” said Mandy Hansen, director of international admissions. “We’re able to get decisions out within 72 hours.” The selection committee views the completed application online with TOEFL scores and transcripts and says yay or nay right away.

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Campus walkways.

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A significant number are from disad-vantaged backgrounds. they win dozens of Gilman Scholarships each year—176 in the past five years—

and three-quarters of the nearly 450 SF State study abroad students receive aid in some form. Yenbo Wu, associate vice president of interna-tional education, said, “We have proven that you can study abroad even if you’re not super rich.” David Wick, coordinator of study abroad services, said, “We’re doing some pretty unique things to make study abroad possible for very diverse, very low income, transfer, and older student populations.” the drive for diversity is a widely shared passion at SF State (both Wick and marilyn Jackson, assistant director of inter-national programs, wrote doctoral dissertations addressing education abroad issues for students of color). the campus is home to the nation’s first and only College of ethnic Studies, created after a prolonged student strike during the an-tiwar and civil rights ferment of the late 1960s. the distinctive-looking student center, topped by tilted pyramids, is named for Cesar Chavez, the farm workers’ leader, and it faces malcolm X Plaza. “We’ve gone beyond diversity. We are a campus for social justice and equity,” said Dean of Students Joseph Greenwell.

It’s no surprise that San Francisco State University (SF State) is a magnet for international

students. The green campus sits in a tranquil corner of one of the world’s most enticing cities,

with Muni trolleys running up to its door and the Pacific Ocean beckoning a mile away. It has

ranked in the top five in international enrollments among master’s level institutions since

1996 and occupied first place three times according to the Institute of International Educa-

tion’s Open Doors report. More surprising, this urban campus is second in the country in an-

other category: participation in year-long study abroad. Most of these students, like the large

majority of all 25,000 undergraduates, are racial or ethnic minorities. “We have this huge

mix racially and ethnically, and that’s who we send,” said Provost Sue Rosser.

San Francisco State

President Robert Corrigan, a stalwart supporter of internationalization, with Provost Sue Rosser.

Shines in Long-Term Study Abroad

Senior Albert (A.J.) Burleson, who grew up in impoverished, historically black Hunter’s Point, started college years ago and even earned a track scholarship at Cal State University, Fresno, but left far short of a degree. He found much greater suc-cess at SF State where he completed a bachelor’s

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degree in sociology and international relations after spending a year at the University of Amsterdam on a Gilman Award. Burleson’s resume includes work on filmmaker Kevin epps documentary Straight Outta Hunter’s Point. He became a peer mentor in the international programs office after return-ing from the Netherlands. “i received so much aid and support, and me coming from the inner city, i see it only fitting that i return the favor by helping others access study abroad,” said the 35-year-old. Another peer mentor, senior Jordan Brown, 26,

a broadcasting and electronic media major who grew up in Sacramento, used his Gilman to study at the University of tübingen and the Hochschule der medien in Stuttgart, Germany, and headed to Ghana after graduation to complete a documen-tary. Brown successfully navigated art and media classes taught in German after one course in San Francisco and six weeks of language classes in Ger-many. “that was intense, but good,” said Brown, who is weighing a possible return to Germany for graduate school.

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Study Abroad Services Coordinator David Wick and Assistant Director of International Programs Marilyn Jackson.

Vice President yenbo Wu and staff of the Office of International Programs

California students Jordan Brown of Sacramento, (l.) and A.J. Burleson (ctr.) with international students Latifa Khaloud Djemili, Shannon Goh, and Robin Neveu. Djemili and Neveu were exchange students from French universities, and Goh is an undergraduate from Malaysia.

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THRIVING DESPITE ECONOMIC CHALLENGESSF State has moved forward with its international-ization efforts during a period of prolonged austerity and budget crises for California’s public institutions. When Yenbo Wu arrived in 2000 to take charge of the office of international Programs, it had a 10-per-son staff. By 2007, when President robert Corrigan, a stalwart supporter of internationalization, elevated Wu to the new position of associate vice president for international education, the staff had grown to 20. A hiring freeze subsequently cost the office two of those positions. A new international student adviser hired in spring 2012 was the first addition to the staff in two years. Corrigan, who retired in July 2012 at age 77 after 24 years, said he felt an obligation to ensure that the international students who enroll in such large numbers have a good ex-perience during their years on the urban campus, including academic advice, mentoring, and opportu-nities to interact with faculty outside the classroom.

Corrigan’s successor is leslie Wong, former presi-dent of Northern michigan University.

Cuts in state aid have led to greater class sizes at SF State, especially in departments depleted by the loss of 100 faculty jobs to attrition. A university planning advisory council that Corrigan appointed to address the budget challenges expressed strong support for “the university’s commitment to inter-nationalization and the benefits that international programs bring to our students.” it also applauded efforts by the office of international Programs (oiP) “to maximize flexibility and efficiency” and took note of “the financial advantages associated with strategically recruiting international students.” in-ternational students bring their global perspective and the numbers needed to develop new programs. in the economics department, which had lost five of 14 faculty members, Sudip Chattopadhyay, the chair, spearheaded the creation of a dual-degree master’s program with Xiamen University that

Vice President yenbo Wu and staff of the Office of International Programs.

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brings to campus a cohort of 30 Chinese students, fully funded by their government, and sends SF State faculty to teach at Xiamen in the summer. “We have to be very innovative as to how we of-fer the same curriculum with reduced resources,” Chattopadhyay said.

A STELLAR FACULTy, A WELCOMING COMMUNITySince fewer than 400 domestic students come from outside California, the international contingent makes an outsize contribution to campus diver-sity. “We’re not Stanford or Berkeley, but this is a university that’s right for most students, not just in the United States but the world,” said Wu, a na-tive of Beijing. the location and SF State’s mission also help attract a stellar faculty. rosser, a zoologist and women’s studies scholar who previously was Georgia tech’s first female dean, said, “We’re re-ally quite fortunate in the caliber of faculty we’re able to attract.”

San Francisco, the city that gave birth to the United Nations, is home to a polyglot population. “We don’t have to do much of a marketing job for San Francisco,” said Jay Ward, the oiP associate direc-tor who has directed international student services since 1994, when there were 1,000 international students. Counting those on optional Practical training, SF State now has more than 2,400. With a third adviser now on board, Ward hopes to extend

office hours and expand programming “to the way it was before.”

Koichiro Aoshima, the Japanese-born coordinator for international student services and outreach, recalled that on the day he first set foot on cam-pus in 1998, “a guy came up to me and asked for directions. He thought i was from here. You just blend in.”

Aoshima and mei-ling Wang, coordinator of in-ternational student advising, advise hundreds of international undergraduate and exchange stu-dents. When speaking with new arrivals, Wang always keeps in mind how she felt as an 18-year-old freshman at Drexel University in Philadelphia, fresh from taiwan. “it isn’t easy. You struggle with the language. i was even afraid to go to grocery shop. i didn’t know how to order a sandwich. ‘Why do they have so many choices?’” she recalled. “You really have to be patient with these students.”

INCUBATING STUDENT LEADERSthere are 26 international clubs at SF State. the largest by far is the 1,800-member international education exchange Council (ieeC). it includes the hundreds of exchange students who come to SF State each year, droves of U.S. students prepar-ing for or newly returned from study abroad, and other students drawn by dozens of weekly events including sports events, film nights, and language

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Koichiro Aoshima and Mei-Ling Wang advise international students.

“We’re not Stanford or Berkeley, but this is a university that’s right for most students, not just in the

United States but the world.

”

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exchange partnerships. the council affords ample opportunities for leadership training with nearly 100 officer positions, including co-U.S. and inter-national presidents.

eric ostlund, 24, a graduate student from Uppsala University, Sweden, studying law, economics, and criminal justice, said, “the ieeC is very different from anything you’re likely to find anywhere else, just in terms of sheer size and magnitude and all the different things we do. We’re one of the few

IEEC Adviser Noah Kuchins uses Facebook to connect incoming international students with on-campus buddies.

environments where if you have an idea and you want to do it, you actually can.”

ostlund was co-president with linda Carter Nguy-en of Alameda, California, whose Vietnamese immigrant parents named her after the actress who played Wonder Woman, from a television show they watched to learn english. Nguyen joined the ieeC to meet French students on campus before her semester in Paris. “i kind of corralled all the French people on campus and said, ‘Be my friend,

Eric Ostlund from Stockholm, Sweden, and Linda Carter Nguyen of Alameda, California, co-presidents of one of the largest student groups, the International Education Exchange Council.

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take care of me.’ So when i went to Paris, that’s what they did. they picked me up in the airport. they introduced me to their friends,” she said. Fly-ing back home, the liberal studies major resolved “to be more involved in the ieeC to keep this in-ternational dream alive.”

ieeC students are a familiar sight on campus—staff-ing a study abroad table on the quad, distributing flyers, and organizing events and activities. they also raise funds for scholarships. Noah Kuchins, the ieeC adviser, works to connect all incoming students with buddies “before they set foot on campus.” He finds prospects when they inquire at the oiP about education abroad. His pitch: “You’re interested in studying in Japan and we’ve got 30 Japanese students coming next semester. Would you want to welcome one of them?”

ExCHANGE BRINGS OPPORTUNITIESStudents can choose among 115 study abroad pro-grams in 28 countries. SF State has 55 bilateral exchanges of its own and offers 51 more through the California State University international pro-grams office. exchanges bring international opportunities to every department, including SF State’s undergraduate cinema major. Since 2010 Weimin zhang, an associate professor and award-winning documentary filmmaker, has led the international Documentary Workshop in Shang-hai, China, each summer in partnership with Xiejin Film and television College at Shanghai Normal University. She brought the first dozen SF State students to Shanghai in June 2010 to collaborate with a dozen Shanghai Normal students over three weeks to conceive, write, and film four 10-minute

documentaries on unusual aspects of life in China, including the local hip hop scene, housing short-ages, and migrant workers’ struggles. the students overcome language barriers. zhang, a graduate of the Beijing Film Academy, said, “even i was sur-prised they can make a film in a language they don’t even know.” President Corrigan, who visited the first workshop, marveled that students shared “a common language of film.” the Shanghai film school also sends several students to San Francisco for a semester each term.

GENERAL EDUCATION INCLUDES GLOBAL PERSPECTIVESAll undergraduates must fulfill a cultural, ethnic, or social diversity requirement. Some 300 courses already contain significant international content. Paul Sherwin, dean of the College of liberal and Creative Arts and formerly dean of humanities, be-lieves a forthcoming general education change will quadruple student enrollment to 4,000 in courses offering comparative study of global issues and regions. “the curriculum already has changed drastically in almost all majors,” even in his own field of english literature, said Sherwin, pointing to a recent hire who teaches a course on Shake-speare’s influence on india’s Bollywood.

“We’re creating global citizens,” said history pro-fessor trevor Getz, an Africa specialist whose popular courses serve as a feeder to education abroad programs in Ghana and South Africa. “it’s not just important that we send our elite abroad. this country does a pretty good job of that. it’s equally important that the kinds of students that we have here are able to have that experience.”

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Associate Professor of Cinema Weimin zhang.

Liberal and Creative Arts Dean Paul Sherwin foresees greater enrollments in courses comparing countries and

regions of the world.

Professor of History Trevor Getz strongly encourages students to study abroad in Africa.

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l e S S o n S learnedBREAKING BARRIERS. The SF State experience has “basically proven” that long-term education abroad need not be a barrier to participation by nontraditional students, said the OIP’s Marilyn Jackson. Added Director Hildy Heath, “Don’t (make) assumptions about what they cannot or will not do. Hold up the vision and provide the pathway, and they can and will do it.” That message is brought to life at study abroad information ses-sions by screening Breaking Barriers, a short film funded by a grant from the former NAFSA Co-Op Program in which nontraditional students describe their life-changing years abroad.

SHORT AND LONG TERM. While SF State takes pride in sending students on semester programs, it doesn’t neglect shorter opportunities. In a city filled with immi-grants, “we’re reconnecting the world” with short courses to Mexico, Cuba, Vietnam, China, South Africa, and Belize, said Ethnic Studies Dean Kenneth Monteiro. Once students go, the obstacles to longer study “no longer look insurmountable.” David Wick pitches study abroad to community college students even before they get to SF State.

EXCHANGES INVIGORATE LEARNING. International exchanges bring vitality and fresh ideas into departments from graphic design to marketing to journalism. Twenty design and industry students typically spend a year in such cities as Dublin, London, Milan, and Sydney. Marketing Professor Sanjit Sengupta regularly teaches at Lappeenranta Uni-versity of Technology in Finland and lectures worldwide on e-commerce. His counterparts are eager to send faculty and students to this university on Silicon Valley’s doorstep.

SOCIAL MEDIA SERVING THE MISSION. SF State has harnessed social media to better serve international students. A Facebook page connects international students “during the critical time between acceptance and arrival on campus,” said Israeli Alilin, outreach adviser. Noah Kuchins, the IEEC adviser, called Facebook “the most effective way to get messages out. That’s how students interact today. They’re on their phones constantly, checking their status updates.”

MAKING THE CASE. In times of austerity, international educators must become even more persuasive internal advocates for internationalization. “It’s not that people don’t believe this is the right thing or a good thing to do,” said Associate Vice President Yenbo Wu. “But people have different academic and other priorities, too. It’s always your job to try to mobilize and convince people that this is a priority.”

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Campus foot traffic.

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T he idea of an international volunteer corps of young Americans already had been percolating in Congress, but the michigan students got the ball rolling,

gathering hundreds of signatures on a petition ex-pressing a willingness to serve in poor countries. Kennedy formally proposed a Peace Corps in a San Francisco speech a few days before winning one of the closest elections in U.S. history. on march 1, 1961, JFK signed an executive order creating the agency, which Congress later wrote into law. Among the first volunteers were Alan and Judy Guskin, the michigan graduate students who or-ganized the petition drive. Half a century later, no tour of the michigan campus is complete without a stop to read the inscription on the marker on the Union steps: “Conception of Peace Corps First mentioned on this Spot october 14, 1960.”

the Peace Corps connection is an indelible part of the identity of the University of michigan, which enrolls nearly 6,000 international students and offers instruction in 65 languages, from Bamana and Bosnian to tamil and twi to Urdu and Uzbek. Founded almost two centuries ago, U-m (it pre-fers the hyphen and never tires of seeing its block letter m logo stamped on sweatshirts and signs) boasts the seventh largest endowment of any U.S. university ($7.8 billion), according to the National Association of College and University Business of-ficers, and conducts more research ($1 billion-plus)

They were just brief remarks in the wee hours of the chill October 1960 night on the stone

steps of the Michigan Union from a tired John F. Kennedy who had flown in after debat-

ing rival Richard Nixon in New York. But the future president threw out a challenge to the

thousands of students who had waited in the drizzle to greet him. Speaking off the cuff, he

asked, “How many of you who are going to be doctors are willing to spend your days in

Ghana? Technicians or engineers, how many of you are willing to work in the foreign ser-

vice and spend your lives traveling around the world?”

University of Michigan

Provost Philip Hanlon says Michigan has made tough budgetary decisions while remaining on its “upward trajectory” and expanding international activities.

Stamps Its Block Letter M on Far Corners of the World

than any campus other than Johns Hopkins, ac-cording to the National Science Foundation. Constitutionally autonomous, it has weathered large cuts in state funding and still managed to hire dozens of new, tenure-track faculty, all while squeezing over a decade nearly a quarter-billion dollars in recurring costs from its $1.6 billion oper-ating budget. “We have navigated this period well. We’ve remained on our upward trajectory and been able to do a lot of things we wanted to do, like increase the number of students who are studying abroad,” said Provost Philip Hanlon.

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RAMPING UP INTERNATIONAL ACTIVITIESFrom a campus with 27,000 undergraduates and 14,000 graduate students, the education abroad numbers have doubled since 2004–05 to nearly 2,000 in 2010–11, with 1,300 others heading abroad for service, internships, and other noncredit op-portunities. President mary Sue Coleman has made it her mission to, as she put it, “ramp up our in-ternational efforts,” in part by leading deans and faculty on carefully planned trips to Africa, China, and Brazil that have produced expanded research partnerships and other initiatives.

the 2008 trip to Ghana—on which she brought the michigan Gospel Chorale—and to South Africa led to creation of an African Presidential Scholars Program that brings ten promising young scholars to Ann Arbor each year for residencies, as well as establishment of a new African Studies Center within the international institute. Coleman has expanded a partnership with Shanghai Jiao tong University (SJtU) in Shanghai, where a michigan faculty member is dean of the Um-SJtU Joint insti-tute that confers dual degrees in engineering. the U-m medical School has a $14 million research partnership with Peking University. At the same time, a top-level U-m task force ruled out opening a branch campus in China, as some universities have done.

INTERNATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES FOR UNDERGRADUATESPresident Coleman also created in 2009 the Chal-lenge for the Student Global experience that has raised tens of millions of dollars for education abroad scholarships. She found internal funds to match $1 for every $2 of large donations, made the

first gift herself, and later donated her 2011 salary increase as well.

more than half of michigan students (53 percent) now study outside europe, compared with 38 per-cent eight years ago. the Center for Global and intercultural Study within the College of litera-ture, Science and the Arts, operates the largest education abroad office on the decentralized cam-pus. U-m faculty serve as resident directors of 40 of its 90 study abroad programs. the center also runs a service program called Global intercultural experience for Undergraduates (GieU) that sends 200 students in small groups, each with a profes-sor, to 15 to 20 places in need around the globe each summer.

Senior Natalie Bisaro, a communications and com-parative literature major, spent a month in Grenada working with young children. “Before going, i was kind of terrified of studying abroad, to be honest,” said Bisaro. “this was all pretty much life chang-ing.” She later spent a semester in Switzerland and took a sports management class in Ann Arbor that included two weeks in london looking at prepara-tions for the Summer olympics. the latter was one of a dozen “Global Course Connections” classes with travel embedded.

lester monts, senior vice provost for academic affairs, pushed for the creation in 2002 of the GieU program. monts, an ethnomusicologist and trumpeter who led the U-m Symphonic Band on a tour of China and helped bring to Ann Arbor the only Confucius institute devoted solely to the arts, said, “one of the things that i’ve tried to do here is not let these big, grand, university initiatives go without some kind of undergraduate involve-ment,” he said.

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Senior Natalie Bisaro overcame a fear of education abroad thanks to the Global Intercultural Experience for Undergraduates.

Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs Lester Monts pushed for undergraduates’ place in major international initiatives.

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ProFIleS oF SUCCeSS at CollegeS anD UnIVerSItIeS | UnIVerSIty oF MIChIgan 41

CLOSE TIES WITH GHANAFittingly, some of michigan’s strongest international ties are to Ghana, the country that Kennedy singled out in his remarks on the Union steps. through a partnership with the Ghanaian ministry of Health, the University of Ghana, and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and technology, dating to the 1980s, the U-m medical School has trained most of the country’s obstetrician-gynecologists and helped reverse a “brain drain” of young physicians who used to leave the country for training. other schools, including engineering, Public Health, and Social Science, also send faculty to teach and con-duct research in Ghana and bring Ghanaian faculty and students to Ann Arbor.

For a class project, biomedical engineering ma-jor Jack Hessburg and classmates spent weeks in Ghana accompanying obstetricians on their rounds in teaching hospitals, and back in Ann Arbor then designed a 17-inch plastic device to place a fabric sleeve around the baby’s head to aid midwives in deliveries. the device awaits approval by health authorities, but “the obstetricians and midwives we were working with were excited and cautiously optimistic,” said Hessburg.

SENDING ENGINEERS AND ARTISTS ABROADthe College of engineering has made a big push to encourage students to study and undertake projects abroad. “We’re broad minded. We talk about study abroad, research abroad, volunteer experiences abroad, engineering projects abroad,” including solar car competitions, said Associate Dean James Paul Holloway. “the goal is not study

abroad. the goal is for students to get outside their comfort zone.”

the engineers are as much interested “in a chal-lenging experience as they are in academic credit,” said Amy Conger, who directs the college’s interna-tional programs. “they want an experience that is engaging, professionally relevant, and that’s going to teach them something new. they want to tackle a problem.”

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Associate Dean of Engineering James Paul Holloway.

Amy Conger, director of international programs for the College of Engineering, says students seek a challenge as much as academic credit abroad.

Biomedical engineering senior Jack Hessburg designed a device to aid Ghanaian midwives.

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Bryan rogers, retiring dean of the School of Art and Design, took an art class while completing a PhD in chemical engineering at University of Califor-nia Berkeley and wound up reengineering himself into a sculptor and installation artist. the School of Art and Design is the smallest school at michi-gan, and rogers spent a couple of years selling the idea of education abroad to his faculty before convincing them to make international travel and study a requirement for the major. rogers, who did postgraduate work at the Academy of Fine Arts in munich, said, “Being somewhere else helped me better understand who i was. that’s what i want for our students and faculty…. the idea is not to go somewhere and get culture dust sprinkled on you, but to get away from the things that you’re familiar with and have an experience that helps you see where you came from.”

GLOBAL SCHOLARS FOR LIFEthe university keeps expanding its international ambit in ways small and large. three years ago it created a living-learning community it calls the Global Scholars Program in which U.S. and international students dwell together on the top two floors of a 10-story dorm and work on social justice projects. “When we advertise, we say we want students who are interested in making the world a better place,” said Jennifer Yim, the di-rector. it quickly filled up with 35 students the first year, 70 the second, and the capacity of 130 the third year. “my students say ‘GSP for life,’” Yim said.

Xiaoxiao liu, a senior from Beijing, served as a GSP resident adviser. He was also president of the student government’s international student affairs committee. liu won math competitions

as a schoolboy in China, but came to the United States for college because he wanted to learn more than the math and sciences emphasized in China’s universities. “Here you can speak what-ever you want to say. People tend to have more diverse views of what’s going on. that’s some-thing i really wanted to explore,” said liu, who pulled off a rare triple major in actuarial math, statistics, and economics.

John Greisberger, director of the international Center, is heartened by the growing number of international undergraduates serving as resident advisers. “Four years ago, fewer than five of the

LEFT TO RIGHT:

Jennifer yim directs the Global Scholars Program, a living learning community for undergraduates.

Dean of Art and Design Bryan Rogers convinced the faculty to require international study.

Senior xiaoxiao Liu from Bejing completed three majors.

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150 to 160 resident advisers were international stu-dents. Now it’s close to 40,” said Greisberger. “it’s a great job on campus. they get free housing and a meal plan. it really does build a multicultural environment within the residence halls.”

AN AREA STUDIES POWERHOUSEmichigan is an area studies bastion, with six na-tional resource centers among the international institute’s 18 centers, plus a federally funded in-ternational business center. But that distinctive strength also means the michigan centers were hard hit in 2011 when Congress cut title Vi fund-ing for the national resource centers by 47 percent. mark tessler, vice provost for international affairs, said, “We’re better prepared than most. Some of

International Institute Director Kenneth Kollman is looking to foundations for help in the wake of Title VI area studies funding cuts.

these centers actually have endowments. i think the university will support us for a while.” But “the biggest unanswered question” is what happens in the long run to the dozens of less commonly taught languages, tessler said. “if universities like us don’t offer them, then the U.S. just won’t have this capacity.”

Kenneth Kollman, director of the international institute, is looking to foundations to help fill in the $1.5 million, two-year funding gap. Although foreign language and area studies fellowships were not cut, Kollman said michigan has had to cut back on summer language workshops and training for michigan high school teachers. the university once calculated that it takes 29 students to pay for each section of a language

Director John Greisberger (in blue blazer) and the International Center staff.

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course, but some of the centers’ languages—including Persian, Serbo-Croatian, tamil, and Quechua—have as few as five students, he said.

GEOGRAPHy LESSONthe university in 2010 launched a “Global michi-gan” Web site, globalportal.umich.edu, that pulls together resources and encourages students and faculty to conduct study and research abroad. “the world is today’s college campus. Never before have we had so much to learn from other nations and cultures,” Coleman says in a videotaped message that ends, “Go Blue—abroad!”

Coleman is unwilling to cede any of michigan’s 65 languages as expendable.

The lights are low but they burn late into the night at the Michigan law library.

“We think it’s very important for a place like michi-gan to keep the breadth and depth as much as possible because we know that many other institu-tions cannot,” the president said. Cutting programs “is our last resort.”

“We had an experience back in the 1980s when we had one of these budget crunches and made the decision to close a couple of academic de-partments,” including geography, Coleman said. “everybody thought there wasn’t any future in geography and then GPS [Global Positioning Sys-tem] came along with all sorts of new things. Now it’s a very robust discipline. Anybody look-ing back now would think that decision was silly. So we are very careful; reducing languages for us would be a very serious decision.”

“We think it’s very important for a place like Michigan to keep the breadth and depth as much as possible because we

know that many other institutions cannot.

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l e S S o n S learnedDEEPENING GLOBAL ENGAGEMENT. An accreditation self-study in 2010 called for expanding international partnerships, not just with “familiar regions and well-established institutions,” but in developing countries. U-M has two large, successful joint research institutes in China. President Coleman said sustained partnerships “take enormous planning and a constant openness to learning.” Provost Hanlon said, “It’s complicated, it’s difficult, and you can’t make it happen overnight.”

INTEGRATING STUDENTS AND SCHOLARS. International Center Direc-tor John Greisberger believes, “The biggest issue we’re facing on our campus is the integration of our international students with our U.S. students.” The university recently added a position to bolster services for students and scholars. Greisberger wants to see an annual research poster session for visiting scholars to showcase their work and “make more of a splash on campus.”

TALKING WITH ONE ANOTHER. A Council on Global Engagement brings 40 faculty and staff from all 19 schools and colleges together each month to discuss best practices and ways to collaborate. Senior Vice Provost Lester Monts said, “the lines of communication now are stronger than they ever have been.” The council also paved the way for appointment of U-M’s first senior health and safety officer. “It’s helped us pull everybody together,” said the College of Engineering’s Amy Conger, the council chair.

GALVANIZING THE CAMPUS. Lisa Rudgers, vice president for global commu-nications and strategic initiatives, said high profile presidential trips have an impact back home as well as abroad. “Our campuses are so large and so decentralized that the trips provide a focal point and tend to galvanize the campus,” she said. “We learn much more about what individual faculty in lots of different disciplines are doing in a region in a country.”

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aWarDSSPotlIght

Providence College is recognized for its major in Global Studies, the University of Arizona is recognized for its Latin American Summer Research Program for underrepresented undergraduate students, and Washington and Jefferson College is recognized for its Magellan Project Program.

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The Center for International Studies is in Harkins Hall.

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G lobal studies seems to have the effect of altering career trajectories. michelle DePlante ‘08, who was among the first to sign up when Providence

created the interdisciplinary major in 2005, does immigrant and refugee work in the rhode island capital. Victoria Neff ‘09 is at the University of Den-ver doing graduate work in international studies after two years in the Peace Corps in China. Alex-andra BetGeorge ‘11 is a Fulbright Scholar teaching english to high school students in Bulgaria.

these are the career paths that leaders at the Catholic college envisioned when it created the in-terdisciplinary major and imbued it with extensive community service requirements across all four years. they must become fluent in a second lan-guage (two advanced level courses) and, naturally, participate in education abroad. the global studies program now has nearly 100 majors and graduates 25 students each year.

AN ETHOS OF SERVICE AND NEW EMPHASIS ON EDUCATION ABROADthe ethos of service runs strong at Providence, the only U.S. college founded and run by the white-robed Dominican Friars, but a push to inter-nationalize students’ experiences picked up steam with the creation of a Center for international Studies in 2007 to facilitate education abroad. the college’s 2011 strategic plan seeks to boost the

When Sonia Penso enrolled at Providence College, it was the dream of her autoworker

parents—Portuguese immigrants whose education stopped in grade school—that she be-

come a doctor or lawyer. Sonia herself envisioned law school as a strong possibility. But

majoring in global studies, studying abroad in Nicaragua and Argentina, and working with

troubled U.S. and Latino youth led her down a different path. She is now a caseworker

with Homeboy Industries, a renowned gang intervention program in Los Angeles. “When

everything shifted, I was really surprised that both my parents were incredibly supportive,”

said the 23-year-old, who graduated in 2011.

Providence College

education abroad participation rate from 15 to 35 percent. An overhaul of the core curriculum ad-dressed the need to develop more engaged students who undertake “research, scholarship, service, in-ternships, and other immersion experiences locally, regionally, and abroad.”

global Studies a Major Draw at

Michelle DePlante, an immigration services coordinator in Providence, co-teaches some of the introductory global studies classes. The 2008 alumna was among the first majors.

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Since making financial aid fully portable for the first time—a step with an annual cost of $3 million—Providence has seen the number of edu-cation abroad students rocket from 163 in 2010–11 to 230 in 2011–12, with even larger numbers pro-jected for the 2012–13 academic year, said Dean of international Studies Adrian Beaulieu, who re-cently hired a fourth staff person for the Center for international Studies. the percentage studying abroad for a full semester has risen to 25 per-cent. Beaulieu said the first mandate he was given when hired as dean in 2007 was “to get serious about study abroad.”

Nicholas longo, now the director of global stud-ies, taught the first introductory course on global studies to 20 students back in 2005 as a part-time lecturer. longo is a summa cum laude graduate from the class of 1996 who majored in political science, minored in a then-new department, public and community service studies, and became a civic engagement activist and scholar. He returned to his alma mater in 2008.

AN INTERDISCIPLINARy FACULTy AND COMMUNITy ADVISERSGlobal studies has no faculty of its own but draws from other departments. longo, an associate pro-fessor in the Department of Public and Community Service, said, “there’s a core group of six faculty from social work, from philosophy, from the busi-ness school, from foreign language, from sociology, and from public service.”

Some courses are co-taught by community advisers such as DePlante, outreach coordinator for inter-national institute rhode island (iiri), a nonprofit that provides educational, legal, and social services to immigrants and refugees throughout the state and southeast New england. She had done volun-teer work for the institute as a college student and joined it full-time upon graduation. Now some of the students she teaches fulfill their service require-ment by volunteering at iiri.

SEEING THE REAL WORLD IMPLICATIONS OF GLOBALIzATIONService learning is built into most of the major’s required courses. Students often work in teams on projects that in longo’s words “examine globaliza-tion and global citizenship through the lens of local community engagement.”

Using local activists as co-teachers “really brings a community voice into the classroom,” said longo, who once was a national student coordinator for the Pew Charitable trusts’ Campus Compact and later directed miami University’s civic leadership institute.

“Students are not just studying globalization in that first course. they are doing service learning and civic engagement projects and seeing what the real world implications of globalization are in Provi-dence,” said longo.

like Sonia Penso, DePlante, the daughter of a Cu-ban immigrant, had to explain her choice of the major “more than once” to her parents and other relatives skeptical of whether it would lead to a job. “But i knew i was learning critical skills that would Global Studies Director Nicholas Longo in Ecuador in 2010.

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be the foundation for any direction i wanted to go,” said DePlante, who minored in business and Span-ish as well. “the major provides the leadership and thinking skills that employers and grad schools are looking for.” She studied and did a business intern-ship in Seville, Spain, then wrote her thesis on the assimilation of Hispanic immigrants in Providence.

A CAPSTONE GLOBALLy ENGAGED THESISmost of Providence’s 3,900 undergraduates do not have to write theses, but the capstone of global stud-ies is a requirement to produce a “globally engaged” thesis. the seniors participate in a year-long seminar synthesizing what they have learned in the class-room and in their community involvement at home and abroad, then write a paper that is supposed to have real world implications, like the comparative study that Penso did on troubled urban youth in Nicaragua, Argentina, and rhode island.

throughout the four years, the majors must de-velop an individualized learning plan and keep an “e-portfolio” tracking their progress in learning a second language, choosing an education abroad program, engaging in civic and service activities, and demonstrating awareness of global issues.

longo said it has taken time to convince some faculty colleagues that global studies was “a rig-orous and legitimate academic discipline,” but the projects students have taken on and their success after graduation have made that task easier. Neff, who came to Providence on a soccer scholarship, wrote her thesis on the role of com-munity organizations in combating HiV/AiDS in sub-Saharan Africa. BetGeorge studied abroad in tunisia, which positioned her well to write a the-sis on the role of Facebook in sparking the first Arab Spring revolution.

REACHING STUDENTS OUTSIDE THE MAJORWhile global studies has had a strong influence on its own students, until this fall there was scant room in its courses for non-majors. But with a newly hired adjunct, the college now offers four sections of introduction to Global Studies instead of two. “Part of the reason we haven’t grown as much as we probably could have is that if you didn’t come in as a global studies major, it was hard to get into the course,” said longo. Now he hopes to “introduce the themes and the concepts from our course to many more students.”

“People aren’t looking at us any more like we were totally crazy for majoring in global studies,” Penso said with a laugh. “For me, it was the best choice i made. i’m so thankful that so many of the experiences that i had”—she worked with gang kids in managua and undocumented youth in Buenos Aires—“were so far out of my comfort zone. it made me feel i can accomplish so much and do so many other things. it prepared us for the real world.”

Global studies students sophomore Jessica Ho and freshman Debi Lombardi celebrating at the Equator on a service project in Ecuador.

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Old Main, the oldest building on campus (1891).

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The University of Arizona conducts more than $60 million a year in research—it was 30th in the National Science Foun-dation rankings for fiscal 2010—and

awards more than 200 PhDs in science, technolo-gy, engineering, and math (Stem) fields annually. Professors welcome these bright undergraduates to their labs and often can make room on the bench for an additional intern. When maria te-resa Velez, associate dean of the Graduate College and director of the summer program, sat down with Sergio Arias, director of international rela-tions at the Universidad de Guanajuato in mexico, to discuss ways to deepen existing institutional ties, they saw how an expanded summer research program could benefit both universities and, in-deed, both countries. the result was the Verano de investigación or Summer of research program, which gives students hands-on lab experience and grooms them for graduate school. originally lim-ited to students from mexican universities, the program now is open to promising students from across latin America.

the track record speaks for itself: more than a third of the 73 undergraduates from the program’s first six summers already are attending graduate schools in the United States, latin America, and europe.

Educators and political leaders alike have worried for years that too few college students

were taking the courses that would prepare them for becoming the nation’s future scientists

and engineers, and there has been special concern about the numbers of women and mi-

norities entering these fields. Back in the mid-1990s the Graduate College at the University of

Arizona (UA) launched a program that brings dozens of promising, underrepresented under-

graduates to the Tucson campus each summer to work alongside mentors in research labs

and help prepare them for graduate school. The National Science Foundation, the National

Institutes of Health, and the university itself provide support for these summer opportuni-

ties, which draw students not just from UA but other U.S. colleges and universities.

University of arizonaBuilds a PhD Pipeline for Latin American Students

All but one student (a Colombian) were mexican but the program now is open to college students throughout latin America.

it is “a win-win situation” for both UA and its latin American partners, said Francisco marmolejo, UA assistant vice president for Western Hemispheric

The Graduate College’s (l. to r.) Mariana Menchola Blanco, a program coordinator; Cynthia Bjerk-Plocke, administrative associate; Maria Teresa Velez, associate dean and program creator; Nadia Alvarez-Mexia, a program coordinator; and Francisco Marmolejo, assistant vice president, Western Hemispheric programs.

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programs and executive director of the Consortium for North American Higher education Collabora-tion (CoNAHeC).

LEARNING THE ARC OF THE RESEARCH PROCESSAndrew Comrie, dean of the UA Graduate College and associate vice president for research, said ap-prenticeships like this are the best way to show students “how fascinating science is” so that “the bug bites.” it deepens their learning and boosts their motivation to tackle “all this tough stuff,” he said.

“it’s a classic model,” Comrie said. “You build the trajectory of the lab experience around framing a research question that intrigues the student, con-ducting experiments for 10 weeks to answer this question, while giving them all this other prepa-ration and professional training. they learn the whole arc of the research process.” they present their findings on posters at a Graduate College sym-posium that wraps up the summer.

the program operates in tandem with the ongoing Summer research institute for 90 un-derrepresented U.S. students. the students live together on campus on dorms and, in addition to their lab work, take a 40-hour class to prepare for the Graduate record examination and to zero in on graduate programs that best match their research and career interests as well as skills. For the latin American students, there is additional tutoring on english skills and seminars from cur-rent graduate students regarding the adjustment issues they are likely to face if they pursue de-grees in the United States.

SUPPORT FROM SPONSORING STATESthe participating universities in mexico and elsewhere customarily pay the students’ travel and living expenses with funds allocated by their federal or state governments. Families contribute as well. UA absorbs other costs, including the $3,500 it would normally charge for six credits of tuition.

Graduate College Dean Andrew Comrie with Isaias Reyes and Maria Alejandra Duarte, both from Sinaloa, Mexico, and part of the Latin America Summer Research Institute Program.

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the program drew seven students in 2007, the first summer, 17 students the next, then dropped to 10 and 12 in 2009 and 2010 as the Arizona legislature was considering and enacting stricter immigration laws, but the number rebounded to 26 in both 2011 and in 2012. the Graduate College, at the behest and expense of Chile’s government, is planning to host Chilean undergraduates in research labs for 10 weeks in an invierno de investigación, or Winter re-search Program. one mexican student co-authored with his mentor an article in the Applied thermal engineering journal. Several UA professors have started collaborations with mexican colleagues as a direct result of mentoring the visiting students.

A FASTER ROUTE TO THE PHDYissel Contreras, 23, of mexico City, spent the summer of 2011 working with Anthony muscat, a professor of chemical and environmental engi-neering, on new techniques for modifying silicon surfaces. Contreras was on the eve of graduating from the National Autonomous University of mexi-co (UNAm) with a bachelor’s degree in technology and was considering other research opportunities in Germany and the Netherlands when a classmate told her about the Arizona program.

“it’s definitely one of the best i’ve ever seen,” she said. “it really prepares students for graduate school. i have to admit my english really improved.” She had studied the language for years in school, “but it’s totally different from being in a place where you were using it all the time.” it also opened up for Con-treras a possibility she did not know existed: going straight into a PhD program without first getting a master’s degree. She is now back in tucson as one of her mentor’s doctoral students.

AMBITIONS TO BE THE “NORTHERNMOST” LATIN AMERICAN UNIVERSITymore than a tenth of the University of Arizona’s 2,700 international students are from latin America, including 162 from mexico, 24 from Brazil, 22 from Chile, and 14 from Colombia (total UA enrollment is

39,000). the border and the city of Nogales, mex-ico, are just 68 miles south of UA’s palm tree-lined campus in the middle of downtown tucson, ringed by mountains and the Sonoran Desert.

marmolejo said the summer program dovetails with UA’s ambition to win recognition “as the northernmost latin American university in the world,” a phrase borrowed from michael Proctor, UA vice president for global initiatives.

the program “internationalizes the university in such a way that underrepresented (American) stu-dents influence the latin Americans, and the latin American students influence the underrepresented students. the meshing … is very important,” said Velez, a clinical psychologist.

the students must have a GPA of 3.0 and a passing score of at least 500 on the test of english as a For-eign language (toeFl). “We like for them to come for the summer between junior and senior year. By then they have the coursework to enable them to really engage in laboratory research. they’re more mature and know english better; that’s the ideal time also to consider if graduate school is for them,” said Velez. the students are asked before-hand which three to five professors they would like to work with and they are matched with one of them if possible.

SWIFT DIVIDENDS University partnerships across borders are com-monplace, but “many times these initiatives become just ceremonial things,” said marmolejo. “the latin American Summer research institute engages faculty and students” and maximizes in-tercultural learning.

the payoff has been swift. of those 73 undergradu-ates from the first six summers, 28 are now in graduate school, including 13 at mexican universi-ties, 11 at UA, and four in europe. “this has been a great tool to move our connections with our partner universities in latin America to the next level,” said marmolejo.Cop

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H aring-Smith, like many Watson fel-lows, gravitated toward academe, teaching theater and writing at Brown University, serving as executive direc-

tor of the Watson Fellowship, becoming a dean and vice president at Willamette University, and then in 2005 being named the twelfth president of Washington & Jefferson College in Washington, Pennsylvania. Washington & Jefferson (W&J) now has its own version of the Watson: the magellan Project, which helps students pursue global intel-lectual adventures during college summers. the college provides both extensive mentoring, includ-ing workshops on how to write compelling project proposals, and financial support to make the proj-ects happen. Since 2008 it has green-lighted and funded 100 magellan Projects, including some that did not require a passport but all of which “involve purposeful travel and exploration in new and unfa-miliar surroundings.” the grants average $2,000.

the college has a one-stop referral location to help students through the application process. the proj-ects are self-directed, but the magellan Scholars painstakingly map their plans in advance with a faculty mentor. they also must convince a com-mittee composed of an associate dean, the head of career services, and three professors that the project is feasible. every scholar attends a writing

When Tori Haring-Smith was in seventh grade, her imagination was captured by a book

the journalist and war correspondent John Sack wrote about his travels to the 13 smallest

countries on the planet. Nine years later, with Swarthmore College diploma in hand, she

set out to retrace his steps to Sark, Swat, Sikkim, and other off-the-beaten-track places. Her

12-month journey came courtesy of a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship, bestowed on a select

group of liberal arts college students for a year of independent travel and study around the

world. Watson fellows don’t have to take classes or do academic research. They just have

to use their imaginations to explore the world, as 2,500 have done since 1969 with gener-

ous grants from the late IBM chairman’s foundation.

Washington & JeffersonStudents Carve Their Own Path on Magellans

Freshman Amanda Tse ’14 was a medical volunteer in Peru on her Magellan project.

workshop in February and commits to telling others (including prospective W&J students) about their journeys upon their return. it is all aimed at assist-ing students “in crafting and in telling compelling

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stories of curiosity and achievement that will be useful throughout their college years” and beyond, as explained on the magellan Project Web site.

FROM DIAGNOSTICIANS TO PROBLEM SOLVERSthe magellan Project has quickly become a signa-ture feature of the college. it has its own $1 million endowment and its laurels include a 2010 Andrew Heiskell Award for innovation in international edu-cation. moreover, said Haring-Smith, it has effected a change in how students view poverty and other social inequities. “it’s taken them from a stance that essentially said, ‘there’s a problem; someone should solve it,’ to ‘there’s a problem and i am going to help solve it.’”

the college, which traces its roots to three “log cabin colleges” established in the 1780s by Presby-terian ministers that merged in 1865, enrolls 1,450 students on a 60-acre campus in the town of Wash-ington, 30 miles south of Pittsburgh.

the college sends about 190 students on tradi-tional education abroad programs each year, many

on faculty-led three-week classes in January. But Haring–Smith was intent on finding new ways to thrust them into situations “where they would be on their own, independently solving problems…without anybody to fall back on.” the magellan Project, she said, was in keeping with the college’s mission statement, which speaks of graduating men and women “prepared to contribute substan-tially to the world in which they live,” and with a 2007 strategic plan that set a goal of bringing “the world into W&J and W&J into the world.”

A LAyPERSON’S GUIDE FOR CANCER PATIENTSthe projects can revolve around independent research, service, or internships, but formal class-room study is out of bounds. Projects have included studying Holocaust sites in europe, examining the healthcare system in Cyprus, volunteering at medi-cal clinics in the Dominican republic and South Africa, and preparing a patients’ guide to granulosa cell tumor (GCt) research.

Sophomore Haley roberts wrote that guide after interning for GCt researchers at the University of Auckland in New zealand. roberts, a student ath-lete and economics major, survived the cancer at age 16. “When i was diagnosed in 2009, i was frustrated that i didn’t fully understand GCt or treatment options or how cancer worked. Patients wanted to know about the science behind their dis-ease to make better medical decisions and talk to their doctors intelligently,” she said, but the typical scientific medical article was indecipherable. As a result, she published The Genetics of Granulosa Cell Tumour, An Unofficial Guide for the Scientifically Illiterate, which has been downloaded hundreds of times from the Granulosa Cell tumour research Foundation’s Web site. roberts, who remains in remission, now aspires to a career in public health.

DECIPHERING THE TAx CODE OF OPPORTUNITIESWashington & Jefferson College had a panoply of student research and internship awards and opportunities before the magellan, but “it was extremely confusing. it was like the tax code,”

Sophomore Haley Roberts (third from r.) did her first Magellan interning with granular cell tumor researchers in New zealand and wrote a guide to the disease she herself survived.

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said Haring-Smith. “We said, ‘let’s call these all magellans.’”

Nick tyger, a molecular biology major, is among a handful of students who snagged three magellans over successive summers. the grants supported his work volunteering and recruiting other students to volunteer to set up health clinics in poor, mountain villages in the Dominican republic near Haiti. He also travelled to Cusco, Peru, to scout other loca-tions for clinics.

that didn’t pan out, but the club tyger established, Presidents Without Borders (a nod to the college nickname), attracted 40 members and sent volun-teers to Nicaragua in summer 2012. tyger, who is headed to chiropractic college, said, “i have a new outlook on the global community. i thought before i left that these types of problems—hunger and poverty—were so much farther away than they actually are. Just a short plane ride and you’re in the midst of it.”

NOT A GOOD MAGELLAN WITHOUT TEARStiffani Gottschall, an economics professor who is the magellan adviser for sophomores, said students typically have “a lot of nerves” as they embark on their projects. “they touch down in the airport in turkey or egypt and find themselves alone. Now what do they do?” she asked. James Sloat, associ-ate dean for assessment and new initiatives, said, “in some sense, it’s not a good magellan unless there are tears along the journey.”

A third of W&J students are the first in their family to attend college and 20 percent qualify for need-based Pell Grants. they do not “have a sense of entitlement or superiority….they feel, ‘i’m just an average per-son,’” Haring-Smith said. it’s an enormous boost to their self-confidence when they extricate themselves from situations “where the last bus has gone up the mountain to the village where they are staying, and they have no money and no place to stay and no phone and no place to call even if they had a phone.”

magellan Scholars are given ample opportunities to speak about their experiences, including recruiting pitches to freshmen before the new students sign a pledge at a matriculation ceremony to work toward becoming global citizens.

EDUCATING PARENTSFreshman, sophomores, and juniors with at least a 2.5 GPA can apply. the college awards about 25 magellans each year. Haring-Smith would like to see many more. increasing the number “actually has more to do with educating parents than educating students,” said the president, who has had to allay concerns of parents worried about sending their daughters or sons off to distant lands alone. She tells them: “You’ve raised a child who can do this.”

Carol Barno of Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, was one of those anxious parents in 2010 when freshman daughter erin set off to study architecture in eu-rope. the mathematics and art major has since done two more magellan projects. “they’ve given her such confidence. She’s not that little 18-year-old girl i sent to W&J saying, ‘oh, God, please take care of her,’” said Barno. erin, a star field hockey player, concurs: “traveling abroad on my own has made me fearless.”

Freshmen Julia Pacilio, Alexandra Helberg, and Rebeca Miller (holding sign) taught English and gender issues and studied health care in Ecuador on their Magellans projects.

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2012 WinnersCollege of Saint Benedict/Saint

John’s UniversityJuniata CollegeNorthern Arizona UniversitySan Francisco State UniversityUniversity of Michigan

2012 spotlightsProvidence CollegeUniversity of ArizonaWashington and Jefferson College

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RECIPIENTS OF ThE SENATOR PAUL SImON AwARD FOR CAmPUS INTERNATIONALIzATION (2003–2012)

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