International Education

Otterbein University Course Catalogs

The Center for International Education & Global Engagement Mission

The goal of global engagement and international education is to provide structured learning contexts in which students experience and observe values, beliefs, and ways of behaving that are different from their own. Guided, reflective, global experiences facilitate the understanding and clarification of a student’s own values and permit evaluation of stereotypes and misperceptions as well as the discovery of similarities between diverse populations. Students who have these experiences are better prepared to work effectively in multicultural and global environments.

Global engagement and intercultural education occur through classroom instruction (via the curriculum, research, or with interactions with international students); through participation in study abroad and off-campus programs (faculty-led short-term programs or longer semester or yearlong programs, domestic urban/rural programs); through participation in service, volunteer or internship programs locally and abroad (refugees, missionary, disaster relief programs, etc.); and through local engagement with multi-ethnic populations in the larger community.

Although often seen as occurring only internationally, domestic interactions can also be a catalyst for intercultural engagement as students reflect on positive and negative affective and cognitive change that results from comparing their own values and beliefs with those encountered. Successful intercultural engagement completed locally results in competences which are relevant to international encounters.

Information on current opportunities is available at http://otterbein.abroadoffice.net/index.html

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The Center for International Education & Global Engagement Mission