University of Richmond Internationalization Efforts to be Showcased by International Educators Group
June 14, 2006
The University of Richmond will be one of three “spotlighted schools” for its internationalization efforts in a report of NAFSA: Association of International Educators.
The report, which will come out in October, is called “Internationalizing the Campus 2006: Profiles of Success.” The other two spotlighted schools are Old Dominion University and Babson College in Massachusetts.
The United States Senate approved a resolution last November designating 2006 as the “Year of Study Abroad.”
NAFSA on its Web site says that it “seeks to recognize institutions where international education has been broadly infused across the fabric of the institution.” Criteria for inclusion include curricular initiatives, innovation in educational philosophy and pedagogy, education, teaching, research and work abroad by U.S. students and faculty, and study by international students and scholars in the United States.
NAFSA is a worldwide association advancing international education and exchange. Most of its nearly 9,000 members can be found on college campuses. Its original name was the National Association of Foreign Student Advisers.
Being recognized in the NAFSA report “means a great deal to us,” said Uliana Gabara, dean of International Education at Richmond, “since it puts Richmond squarely in the company of nationally recognized institutions across all sectors of higher education.” Gabara is president of the Association of International Education Administrators.
Richmond has approached internationalization comprehensively since the Office of International Education was created in 1987. Sixteen percent of the faculty comes from a personal or professional international background. The university also has hosted visitors that include writers from Ghana and Russia, an Italian theatre director and documentary film maker, an Argentinean political scientist, a historian from New Zealand and others.
Since 1989 the university has helped fund 13 faculty seminars abroad in countries such as Yemen, Yugoslavia, China and Argentina. Richmond faculty visit exchange institutions, listen to seminars, conduct research and learn how to teach and advise students about the host countries.
Last fall, the total international student population at Richmond was 185 students, representing 70 countries. They represented about 5 percent of the total student population.
Most Richmond students study abroad a semester or year at one of many partner institutions around the world. The program’s aim is to integrate the students fully into the academics and culture of the host country.
Richmond’s degreed international alumni include a Princeton professor from Moscow, an Indian World Bank officer, an ING executive from Warsaw and the Turkish director of a non-governmental organization.