Volume IV: What works, what matters, what lasts

What Works: Infusing a Global Dimension into the Undergraduate STEM Learning Environment

Faculty:

  • have a long-range career plan that includes experiences with STEM colleagues around the world to advance their scholarly career and enhance the learning of their students
  • realize the transformative value of global experiences on professional development
  • are role models for students in respecting and welcoming differences based on culture, different ways of thinking about the natural and the man-made worlds
  • take responsibility for developing (and redeveloping) courses and programs with a global dimension
  • are flexible in regard to curricular requirements so to facilitate student study abroad

Curriculum:

  • has flexible curricular requirements, including credit for learning abroad
  • incorporates a global dimension into lower level, on-campus STEM courses that serve majors and non-majors
  • offers a variety of models with cross-cultural components, from on-campus learning to full immersion in another culture
  • recognizes how the study of language and other non-STEM disciplines enriches the formal and informal learning experiences of STEM students
  • reflects the understanding that science/technology are global resources, and that scientists have a social responsibility

Institution:

  • embraces the concept of "development of a global dimension," incorporating it into the institutional mission statement
  • reward faculty for leadership and involvement in infusing a global dimension...
  • has formal mechanisms to assess and reassess needs, progress, and goals on a regular basis to ensure continued quality of program
  • have an "internationalized" campus, with programmatic integration of international students and faculty, with library and other sources for easy access to international journals and materials
  • has faculty policies for recruitment, promotion, tenure and reward that signal globalizing the curriculum and campus is valued
  • takes care to track emerging career opportunities, and the movement of alumni into careers in the global S&T workforce
  • has clear administrative processes and structures to facilitate new and existing connections and collaborations between the campus and colleagues in other parts of the world.

Facilities:

  • accommodates regular (electronic) communication with colleagues around the world, enriching learning and enhancing research.

Students:

  • recognize that international opportunities cost something, yet see the value and relevance of the experience
  • understand the connection between the on-campus and the global learning experiences
  • appreciate cultural differences, and have a new appreciation of the United States.